r- 






EMANCIPATIONj 




TLIAM E. CHANNING. 



NEW-YORK: 

PUBLIi:HF.D BY THE AMERICAX ANTI-SLAVERY 
SOCIETV, 1-13 NASSAU STREET. 

1841. 






•^>/ 



MUNI 



W. S. DORR, PRINTER, 

123 Fultou-3t. 



r^ 

^ " 






INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



The following tract grew almost insensibly out of the strong 
impressions received from recent accounts of the emanci- 
pated British Islands. Joseph John Gurney, well known 
among us as a member and minister ot the Quaker denomi- 
ation, was so kind as to visit me after his return from the 
West Indies, and then transmitted to me his " Familiar 
Letters to Henry Clay,"* describing a winter in those re- 
gions. The satisfaction which I felt was so great, that I 
could not confine it to myself. I began to write, as a man 
begins to talk after hearing good news. Many thoughts, 
connected with the tgpic, rushed successively into my 
mind ; and gradually, arid with little labor, this slight work 
took the form it now wears. I am encouraged to hope that 
it is of some little value from the spontaneousness of it« 
growth. 

This tract was prepared for the press some time ago, and 
should have been published immediately after the appear- 
ance of Mr. Gurney's letters. But I was discouraged by 
the preoccupation of the minds of the whole community 
with the politics of the day. I was obliged to wait for the 
storm to pass ; and I now send it forth in the hope, that 

* The book is entitled " Familiar Letters to Henry Clay of Ken- 
tucky, describing a Winter in tke West indies. By Joseph John 
fiurjiey." 



^sorae at least are at leisure to give me a short hearing. 
Not that I expect to be heard very widely. No one knows 
mors than I do, the want of popularity of the subject. 
Multitudes would think it a waste of time to give their 
thoughts to this great question of justice and humanity. 
But still there are not a few to whom the truth will be weir 
pome. Such will find, that in these pages I am not going again 
pver the ground which I have already travelled, and I hope 
they will feel, that, having begun with " Slavery," I am 
^tly ending with " Emancipation." 

The latter part of the tract discusses a topic, which I 
have occasionally touched on, but which needs a more full 
exposition, and on which I have long wished to communi- 
cate my views. The Duties of the Free States, in regard to 
^layery, need to be better understood, and my suggestions 
I hope will be weighed with candor. As I have taken little 
Interest for years in the politics of the day, and as my hope 
for the country rests not on any party, but solely on our 
means of education, and on moral and religious influences, 
i ought not to be accused of wishing to give a political 
aspect to the anti-slavery cause. I am very unwillina 
that it should take the form of a struggle for office and 
power. Still it has political relations ; and of these I shall 
speak with perfect freedom. The topic is an exciting 
pne ; but as I look at it with perfect calmness, I hope j 
phall not disturb the niinds pf others, 
Npy. 15th, 1840. 



EMANCIPATION. 



At length a report of West Indian Emancipation has 
reached us, lo which some heed will be given ; and it is 
so cheering, that I should be glad to make it more exten- 
sively known. We have had, already, faithful and afFectmg 
accounts of this great social revolution ; but coming from 
men, who bear an unpopular name, they have received lit- 
tle attention. Here we have the testimony of a man in no 
way connected with American Abolitonists. In his long re- 
sidence among us, Mr. Gurnev has rather shunned this 
party, whether justly or wisely I do not say. The fact is 
stated simply to prevent or remove a prejudice from which 
he ought not to suffer. He came to this country on no 
mission from the enemies of slavery in his ovfn land. Nor 
did he come as so many travellers do, to gather or invent 
materials for a marketable book ; but to preach the gospel 
in obedience to what he thought "a heavenly call." In 
this character he visited many parts of our land, and every 
where secu^-ed esteem as a man, and won no small attention 
to his religious teachings. After many labors here, he 
felt himself charged with a divine message to the West 
Indies. His first object in travelling over those islands was to 
preach ; but in his various journies and communications 
with individuals, he naturally opened his eyes and ears to 
the subject, which there engrosses almost every thought, 
and in which his own philanthropy gave him special inter- 
est. In his " Letters" he furnishes us with the details 
and a few results of his observation, interspersed with some 
personal adventure, and with notices of the natural appear- 



ances and productions of regions so new and striking to an 
Englishman. The book has the merit of perfectly answering 
its end, which is not to reason about emancipation, but to 
make the reader a spectator, and to give him facts for his 
now reflection. It i? written with much ease, simplicity, 
clearness, and sometimes, with beauty. It is especially 
distinguished by a spirit of kindness. It not only expresses 
a sincere Christian philanthropy, but breathes a good hu- 
mor which must disarm even the most prejudiced. They 
who have refused to read anti^slavery productions because 
steeped in gall, will find no bitter ingredients here. Not 
that there is a spirit of compromise or timidity in our au- 
thor. He is a thoroughly kind-hearted man, and conscien- 
tiously believes that he can best serve the cause of truth 
&nd liberty by giving free utterance to his own benignant spirit. 
The book has not only the substantial merit of fidelity on 
a subject of immense importance, but another claim, 
which may operate more widely in its favor. It is enter- 
taining. It does not give us dull and dry wisdom, but the 
quick, animated observations of a man, who saw with his 
heart as well as his eyes, who took a strong interest in 
what he describes. 

That the book is entirely impartial, I do not say. This 
highest merit of a book seems to require more than human 
virtue. To see things precisely as they are, with not a 
shade or coloring from our own prejudices or affections, is 
the last triumph of self-denial. The most honest often see 
what they want to see ; and a man, so honored as Mr. 
Gurney, is very apt to be told what he wants to hear. But 
the book bears strong marks of truth. The uprightness of 
the author secures us against important error. Let even 
large deductions be made for his feelings, as a quaker, 
against slavery, for his sympathy with the negro and the 
negro's friends. After every allowance the great truth 
will come out, that the hopes of the most sanguine advo- 
cates of Emancipation have been realized, if not surpassed, 
in the West Indies. 

Such a book is much needed. There has been in this 
country a backwardness, almost an unwillingness, to be- 
lieve good reports from the West Indies. Not a few have 



desired to hear evil, and have propagated so industriously 
every fiction or exaggeration unfavorable to freedom, that 
the honest and benevolent have been misled. The general 
state of mind among us in regard to West Indian Emanci- 
pation has been disheartening. So deadly a poison has 
Southern slavery infused into the opinions and feelings of 
the North, especially in the larger cities, that few cordial 
wishes for the success of Emancipation have met our ears. 
Stray rumors of the failure of the experiment in this or that 
Island have been trumpeted through the country by the 
newspapers, and the easy faith of the multitude has been 
practised on, till their sympathies with the oppressed have 
become blunted. I have myself seen the countenance of a 
man, not wanting in general humanity, brighten at ac- 
counts of the bad working of emancipation. In such a 
state of feeling and opinion, a book like Mr. Gurney's is in- 
valuable. The truth is told simply, kindly ; and, though 
it may receive little aid from our newspapers, must find its 
way into the hands of many honest readers. I offer a few 
extracts, not to take the place of the book, but in the hope 
of drawing to it more general attention. So various and 
interesting are the details, and so suited. to the various pre- 
judices and misapprehensions common in our country, that 
my only difficulty is to make a selection, — to know where 
to stop. He first visited Tortola. 

" We could not but feel an intense interest in making 
our first visit to a British island, peopled with emancipa- 
ted negroes. Out of a population of nearly five thousand, 
there are scarcely more than two hundred white persons ; 
but we heard of no inconveniences arising from ihis dispa- 
rity. We had letters to Dr. Dyott, the Stipendiary Magis- 
trate, and to some of the principal planters, who greeted us 
with a warm welcome, and soon relieved us from our very 
natural anxiety, by assuring us that freedom was working 
well in Tortola. One of our first visits was to a school for 
black children, under the care of Alexander Bott, the pious 
minister of the Parish Church. It was in good order — the 
children answered our questions well. We then proceeded 
to the jail ; in which, if my memory serves me right, we 



s 

found only one prisoner, with the jailor, and the judge! — 
Our kind friend, Francis Spencer Wigley, the Chief Justice 
of the British Virgin Islands, happened to be there, and 
heered us with the information, that crime had vastly de- 
creased since the period of full emancipation." p. 25. 

His next visit was to St. Christopher's. 

" I mounted one of the Governor's horses, and enjoyed 
a solitary ride in the country. Although it was the seventh 
day of the week, usually applied by the emancipated labor- 
ers, to their private purj)oses, I observed many of them dili- 
gently at work on the cane grounds, cutting the canes for 
the mill. Their aspect was that of physical vigor, and 
cheerful contentment, and all my questions as I passed a- 
long, were answered satisfactorily. On my way, I ven- 
tured to call at one of the estates, and found it was the home 
of Robert Claxton, the solicitor General of the Colony, a 
gentleman of great intelligence and respectability. He was 
kind enough to impart a variety of useful, and in general, 
cheering, information. One fact mentioned by him, spoke 
volumes. Speaking of a small property on the island be- 
longing to himself, he said, ' Six years ago, (that is, shortly 
before the act of emancipation,) it was worth only £2,000, 
with the slaves upon it. Now, without a single slave, it is 
worth three times the money. I would not sell it for 
£6,000.' This remarkable rise in the value of property, is 
by no means confined to particular estates. I was assured 
that, as compared with those times of depression and alarm 
which preceded the act of emancipation, it is at once gene- 
ral and very considerable. I asked the President Crook, 
and some other persons, whether there was a single indi- 
vidual on the Island, who wished for the restoration of sla- 
very. Answer, ' Certainly not one.' " p. 34. 

" ' They will do an infinity of work," said one of my in- 
formants, 'for loages.' 

" This state of things is accompanied by a vast increase 
in their own comforts. Our friend Cadman, the Methodist 
minister, was on chis station, during slavery, in the year 
1826. He has now returned to it under freedom. ' The 
change for the better,' he observed, ' in the dress, demea- 



9 

nor, and welfare of the people, is prodigious.'' The im- 
ports are vastly increased. The duties on them were £1,000 
more in 183S,'than in 1837 ; and in 1839, double those of 
1838, within £150. This surprising increase is owing to the 
demand on the part of the free laborers, for imported goods, 
especially for articles of dress. The difEcultv experienced 
by the gentry living in the town, in procuring fowls, eggs, 
&c. from the negroes, is considerably increased. The rea- 
son is well known — the laborers make use of them for home 
consumption. Marriage is now become frequent amongst 
them, and a profusion of eggs is expended on their wedding 
cakes !' Doubtless they will soon learn to exchange these 
freaks of luxury, for the gradual acquisition of wealth." 
p. 36. 

He next visited Antigua. 

" Our company was now joined by Nathaniel Gilbert, an 
evangelical clergyman of the church of England, and a large 
proprietor and planter on the island. Both he and Sir Wil 
liam, the Governor, amply confirmed our previous favorable 
impressions respecting the state of the colony. On my in- 
quiring of them respecting the value of landed property, 
their joint answer was clear and decided. ' At the lowest 
computation, the land, without a single slave upon it, is fully 
as valuable now, as it was, including all the slaves, before 
emancipation.' In other words, the value of the slaves is 
already transferred to the land. Satisfactory as is this com^ 
putation, I have every reason to believe that it is much be- 
low the mark. With respect to real property in the town 
of St. John's, it has risen in value with still greater rapidity. 
A large number of new stores have been opened ; new 
houses are built or building; the streets have been cleared 
and improved ; trade is greatly on the increase ; and the 
whole place wears the appearance of progressive wealth and 
prosperity." p. 43. 

" Extensive inquiry has led us to the conviction, that on 
most of the properties of Antigua, and in general throughout 
the West Indies, one-third only of the slaves were opera- 
tive. AVhat with childhood, age, infirmity, sickness, sham 
sickness, and other causes, full two-thirds of the negro popu- 



10 

lation, might be regarded as dead weight. The pecuniar)' 
saving, on many of the estates in Antigua, by the change of 
slave for free labor, is at least thirty per cent.'''' pp. 45, 46. 

" We had appointed a meeting at a country village called 
Parham. It was a morning of violent rain ; but about two 
hundred negroes braved the weather, and united with us in 
public worship. It is said that they are less willing to come 
out to their places of worship in the rain, than was the case 
forn\erly. The reason is curious. They now have shoes 
and stockings, which they are unwilling to expose to the 
mud." p. 47. 

" It is a cheering circumstance of no small importance, 
that there are no less, as we were told, than seven thousand 
scholars in the various charity schools of Antigua. In all 
these schools the Bible is read and taught. Who can doubt 
the beneficial moral efTect of these extensive efforts ?" 
p.. 48. 

" The vicar of St, John's, during the last seven years of 
slavery, married only one hundred and ten pair of negroes. 
In the single year of freedom, 1839, the number of pairs 
married by him, was 185. 

" With respect to crime — it has been rapidly diminishing 
during the last few years. The numbers committed to the 
house of correction in 1837 — chiefly for petty offences, for- 
merly punished on the estates — were 850 ; in 1838 only 
344.; in 1839, 311. The number left in the prison at the 
close of 1837, was 147 ; at the close of 1839, only 35. 

" Nor can it be doubted that the personal comforts of the 
laborers have been, in the mean time, vastly increased. The 
duties on imports in 1833, (the last year of slavery) were 
£13,576 ; in 1839, they were £24,650. This augmentation 
has been occasioned by the importation of dry goods and 
other articles, for which a demand, entirely new, has arisen 
among the laboring population. The quantity of bread and 
meat used as food by the laborers is surprisingly increased. 
Their wedding cakes and dinners are extravagant, even to 
the point, at times, of drinking champagne ! 

" In connection with every congregation in the island, 
whether of the Church of England, or among the Dissen- 
ters, has been formed a friendly society. The laborers sub» 



II 

scribe their weekly pittances to these institutions, and drav^ 
out comfortable supplies, in case of sickness, old age, bu- 
rials, and other exigencies. Thus is the negro gradually 
trained to the habits of prudence and foresight." 

" A female proprietor, who had become embarrassed, 
was advised to sell off part of her property, in small lots.— 
The experiment answered her warmest expectations. The 
laborers in the neighborhood, bought up all the little free- 
holds with extreme eagerness, made their payments faith- 
fully, and lost no time in settling on the spots which they 
had purchased. They soon framed their houses, and brought 
their gardens into useful cultivation with yams, bananas,- 
plantains, pine-apples, and other fruits and vegetables, in- 
cluding plots of sugar cane. In this way Augusta and 
Liberta sprang up as if by magic. I visited several of the 
cottages, in company with the Rector of the Parish, and 
was surprised by the excellence of the buildings, as well as 
by the neat furniture, and cleanly little articles of daily use, 
which we found vi'ithin. It was a scene of contentment and 
happiness ; and I may certainly add, of industry : for these 
little freeholders occupied only their leisure hours, in work- 
ing on their own grounds. They were also earning wages 
as laborers on the neighboring estates, or working at Eng- 
lish Harbor, as mechanics." p. 49. 

''We were now placed in possession of clear documen- 
tary evidence, respecting the staple produce of the island. 
The average exports of the last five years of slavery, (1829' 
to 1833 inclusive) were, sugar, 12,189 hogsheads ; molasses 
3,308 puncheons ; and rum 2,468 puncheons. Those of the 
first five years of freedom, (1834 to 1838 inclusive,) were, 
sugar 13,545 hogsheads ; molasses 8,308 puncheons ; and 
rum 1,109 puncheons: showing an excess of 1,356 hogs- 
heads of sugar, and of 5,000 puncheons of molasses ; and a 
diminution of 1,359 puncheons of rum. This comparison is 
surely a triumphant one ; not only does it demonstrate the 
advantage derived from free labor during a course of five 
years, but affords a proof that many of the planters of An- 
tigua have ceased to convert their molasses into rum. It 
ought to be observed that these five years of freedom inclu- 
ded two of drought, one, very calamitous. The statement- 



12 

for 1839, forms an admirable climax to this account. It is 
as follows: sugar 22,383 hogsheads; (10,000 beyond the 
last average of slavery,) 13,433 puncheons of molasses ; 
(also 10,000 beyond that average,) and only 582 puncheons 
of rum ! That, in the sixth year of freedom, after the fair 
trial of five years, the exports of sugar from Antigua, al- 
most doubled the average of the last five years of slavery, is 
a fact which precludes the necessity of all other evidence. 
By what hands was this vast crop raised and realized 1 By 
the hands of that lazy and impracticable race, (as they have 
often been described,) the negroes. And under what sti- 
mulus has the work been effected 1 Solely under that of 
moderate wages." p. 53. 

He next visited Dominica, of which he gives equally fa- 
vorable accounts ; but I hasten to make a few extracts from 
his notices of Jamaica, the island from which the most un- 
favorable reports have come, and in which the unwise and 
unkind measures of the proprietors, particularly in regard to 
rents, have done much to counteract the good influences ot 
emancipation. 

** We were glad to observe that the day (Sunday) was re- 
markably well observed at Kingston — ^just as it is in many 
of the cities of your highly favored Union. A wonderful 
scene we witnessed, that morning, in Samuel Oughton's 
Baptist Chapel, which we attended, without having com- 
municated to the people any previous notice of our coming. 
The minister was so obliging as to make way for us on the 
occasion, and to invite us to hold our meeting with his flock, 
after the manner of Friends. Such a flock we had not be- 
fore seen, consisting of nearly three thousand black people, 
chiefly emancipated slaves, attired after their favorite cus- 
tom, in neat white raiment, and most respectable and order- 
ly in their demeanor and appearance. They sat in silence 
with us, in an exemplary manner, and appeared both to un 
derstand, and appreciate, the doctrines of divine truth, 
preached on the occasion. The congregation is greatly in- 
creased, both in numbers and respectability, since the date 
of full freedom. They pour in from the country partly on 
foot, and partly on mules, or horses, of their own. They _ 



13 

now entirely support the mission, and are enlarging theif 
chapel at the expense of £1,000 sterling. Their subscrip- 
tions to this and other collateral objects, are at once volun- 
tary and very liberal. ' I have brought my mite for the 
chapel,' said a black woman, once a slave, to S. Oughton, 
a day or two before our meeting ; ' I am sorry it is no more ;' 
she then put into his hand two pieces of gold, amountmg ta 
five dollars." p. 74. 

" Here it may be well to notice the fact, that the 
great majority of estates in Jamaica, belong to absentee 
proprietors, who reside in England. In Jamaica, they are 
placed under the care of sorpe attorney, or representative' 
of the owner ; one attorney often undertaking the care of 
numerous estates. Under the attorney, is the overseer, ort 
each particular property, on whom the management almost 
exclusively devolves. This state of things is extremely 
unfavorable to the welfare of Jamaica. If the proprietors 
cannot give their personal attention to their estates, it 
would certainly be a better plan to lease them to eligible 
tenants on the spot — a practice which has, of late years, 
been adopted in many Instances. It is only surprising that 
estates never visited by the proprietor, and seldom by the 
attorney, but left to the care of inexperienced young men, 
often of immoral character, should prosper at all. Nor would 
they prosper, even as they now do, but fortwo causes ; first 
the exuberant bounty of nature, and secondly the orderly, 
inoffensive conduct, and patient industry of the negro 
race." p. 85. 

" The rapid diffusion of marriage among the negroes, 
and the increase of it even among the white inhabitants 
in Jamaica, is one of the happiest results of freedom. 
"VVe were assured on good authority that four times as 
many marriages took place, last year in Jamaica, as in an 
equal population, on an average, in England — a fact which 
proves not only that numerous new connections are formed 
but also that multitudes who were formerly living as a maa 
and wife without the right sanction, are now convinced of the 
sinfulness of the practice, and are availing themselves, 
with eagerness, of the maniage covenant. It appears 



14 

that upwards of 1600 negro couples, were married in the 
Baptist churches alone, during the year 1839." p. 86. 

"In the Parish (or county) of St. Mary, rent and wages 
have been arranged quite independently of each other, and 
labor has been suffered to find its market, without obstruc- 
tion. The consequence is, that there have been no diflier- 
ences, and the people are working well. The quantity of 
work obtained from a freeman there, is far beyond the old- 
task of the slave. In the laborious occupation of holing, 
the emancipated negroes perform double the work of the 
slave, in a day. In road maknjg the day's task under slave- 
ry, was to break four barrels of stone. Now, by task- 
work a weak hand will fill eight barrels, a strong one 
from ten to twelve." p. 89. 

"At the Baptist station at Sligoville, we spent several 
hours. It is located on a lofty hill, and is surrounded by 
fifty acres of fertile mountain land. This property is divi- 
ded into one hundred and fifty freehold lots, fifty of which 
had been already sold to the emancipated laborers, and had 
proved a timely refuge for many laborers who had been 
driven, by hard usage, from their former homes. Some of 
them had built good cottages ; others, temporary huts ; and 
others again were preparing the ground for building. 1 heir 
gardens were cleared, or in process of clearing, and in many 
cases already brought into fine cultivation. Not a hoe, I 
believe, had ever been driven into that land before. Now, 
a village had risen up, with every promise of comfort and 
prosperity, and the land was likely Jo produce a vast abun- 
dance of nutritious food. The people settled there were 
all married pairs, mostly with families, and the men em- 
ployed the bulk of their time in working for wages on the 
neighboring estates. The chapel and the school were im- 
mediately at hand, and the religious character of the people 
stood high. Never did I witness a scene of greater indus- 
try, or one more marked by contentment for the present, 
and hope for the future. How instructive to remember that 
two years ago, this peaceful village had no existence !"— - 
p. 90. 

" On our' return home we visited two neighboring estates,- 
of about equal- size, (I believe,) and equal fertility ; both, 



15 

among the finest properties for natural and local advantages, 
which I any where saw in Jamaica. One was in difficulty 
— the other all prosperity. The first was the estate alrea- 
dy alluded to, which had been deprived of so many hands, 
by vain attempts to compel the labor of freemen. There, 
if I am not mistaken, I saio, as we passed by, the clear 
marks of that violence, by which the people had been ex- 
pelled. The second, called ' Davvkin's Caymanas,' was un- 
der the enlightened attorneyship of Judge Bernard, who 
with his lady, and the respectable overseer, met us on the 
spot. On this property the laborers were independent ten- 
ants. Their rent was settled, according to the money value 
of the tenements which they occupied, and they were al- 
lowed to take their labor to the best market they could find. 
As a matter of course, they took it to the home market ; 
and excellently were they working on the property of their 
old master. The attorney, the overseer, and the laborers, 
all seemed equally satisfied — equally at their ease. Here, 
then, was one property which would occasion a bad report 
of Jamaica — another which would as surely give rise to a 
good report. As it regards the properties themselves, both 
reports are true — and they are the respective results of two 
opposite modes of management. 

"At Dawkin's Caymanas, we had the pleasure of wit- 
nessing an interesting spectacle ; for the laborers on the 
])roperty, with their wives, sons and daughters, were on 
that day, met at a picnic dinner. The table, of vast length, 
was spread under a wattled building erected for the purpose, 
and at the convenient hour of six in the evening, (after the 
day's work was finished,) was loaded with all sorts of good 
fare — soup, fish, fowls, pigs, snd joints of meat in abund^ 
ance. About one hundred and fifty men and women, of the 
African race, attired with the greatest neatness, were as- 
sembled, in much harmony and order, to partake of the 
feast ; but no drink was provided, stronger than water. It 
was a sober, substantial repast — the festival of peace and 
freedom. This dinner was to have taken place on New- 
Year's day ; but it so happened, that a Baptist meeting- 
house in another part of the island, had been destroyed by 
fire ; and at the suggestion of their minister, these honest 



16 ' 

people agreed to waive their dinner, and to subscribe their 
money, instead, to the rebuilding of the meeting-house.-— 
For this purpose they raised a noble sum, (I believe consid- 
erably upvv'ards of £100 sterling;) and now, in the third 
month of the year, finding that matters were working well 
with them, they thought it well to indulge themselves with 
their social dinner. By a unanimous vote, they commis- 
sioned me to present a message of their affectionate regards, 
to Thomas Clarkson and Thomas Fowell Buxton, ihe two 
men to whom, of all others, perhaps, they were the most 
indebted for their present enjoyment." pp. 91, 92. 

" After breakfast we drove to Kelley's, one of Lord Sli- 
go's properties. We saw the people on this property busi- 
ly engaged in the laborious occupation of holing — a work 
for which ploughing is now pretty generally substituted, in 
Jamaica. ' How are you all getting along 1' said my com- 
panion, to a tall, bright-looking black man, busily engaged 
with his hoe. ' Right well, massa, right well,' he replied. 

* I am from America,' said my friend, ' where there are ma- 
ny slaves : what shall I say to them from you '? shall I tell 
them that freedom is working well here V ' Yes, massa,' said 
be 'much well under freedom — thank God for it.' 'Much 
weir they were indeed doing, for they were earning a dollar 
tor every hundred cane holes — a great effort certainly, but 
one which many of them accomplished by four o'clock in 
the afternoon. ' How is this V asked the same friend, as he 
felt the lumps or welts on the shoulder of another man. — 

* 0, massa,' cried the negro, ' I was flogged when a slave, 
no more whip now — all free.' " p. 96. 

"The prosperity of the planters in Jamaica, must not be 
measured by the mere amount of the produce of sugar or 
coffee, as compared with the time of slavery. Even where 
produce is diminished, profit will be increased — if freedom 
be fairly tried — by the saving of expense. ' I had rather 
make sixty tierces of coffee,' said A. B., 'under freedom, 
than one hundred and twenty under slavery — such is the 
saving of expense, that I make a better profit by it — never- 
theless, I mean to make one hundred and twenty, as be- 
fore.'" p. 118. 

" ' J)o you see that excellent new stone wall round the 



17 

field below us 1' said the young physician to me, as we stood 
at A. B.'s front door, surveying the delightful scenery. — ■ 
' That wall could scarcely have been built at all, under sla- 
very, or the apprenticeship ; the necessary labor could not 
have been hired at less than £5 currency, or about SlSper 
chain. Under freedom, it cost only from ^3 50 to $4 per 
r,hain — not one third of the amount. Still more remarkable 
is the fact, that the whole of it was built, under the stimu- 
lus of job-work, by an invalid negro, who, during slavery, 
had been given up to a total inaction.' This was the sub- 
stance of our conversation — the mformation was afterwards 
fully confirmed by the proprietor. Such was the fresh blood 
infused into the veins of this decrepid person, by the genial 
hand of freedom, that he had been redeemed from absolute 
uselessness — had executed a noble work — had greatly im- 
proved his master's property — and finally, had realized for 
himself a handsome sum of money. This single fact is 
admirably and undeniably illustrative of the principles of 
the case ; and, for that purpose, is as good as a thousand." 
p. 119. 

" I will take the present opportunity of offering to thy at- 
tention the account of exports from Jamaica, (as exhibited 
in the return printed for the House of Assembly,) for the 
last year of the apprenticeship, and the first of full free- 
dom : 

Hhds. 
Sugar, for the year ending 9th month, (Sept.) 

30, 1838, 53,825 

Do. do. do. 1839, 45,359 



Apparent diminution, 8,466 

" This difference is much less considerable than many 
persons have been led to imagine ; the real diminution, 
however, is still less ; because there has lately taken place 
in Jamaica, an increase in the size of the hogshead. In- 
stead of the old measure, which contained 17 cwt , new 
ones have been introduced, containing from 20 to 22 cwt. ; 
a change which, for several reasons, is an economical one 
/or the planter. Allowing only five per cent, for this change, 
b* 



18 

the deficiency is reduced from 8,466 hogsheads, to 5,175 [ 
and this amount is further lessened by the fact, that in con* 
sequence of freedom, there is a vast addition to the con* 
sumption of sugar among the people of Jamaica itself, and 
therefore to the home sale. 

" The account of coffee is not so favorable. 

CwL 
Coffee, for the year ending 9th month, (Sept.) 

30, 1838, 117.313 

Do. do. do. 1839. 78.759 



Dimmution, (about one third) 38,554 

" The coffee is a very uncertain crop, and the deficiency, 
on the coQiparison of these two years, is not greater, I be- 
lieve, than has often occurred before. We are also to re- 
member, that both in sugar and coffee, the profit to the 
planter may be increased by the saving of expense, even 
when the produce is diminished. Still, it must be allowed 
that some decrease has taken place, on both the articles, in 
connection with the change of system. With regard to 
the year 1840, it is expected that coffee will at least main- 
tain the last amount ; but a farther decrease on sugar is 
generally anticipated. 

" Now so far as this decrease of produce is connected 
with the change of system, it is obviously to be traced to 
a corresponding decrease in the quantity of labor. But here 
comes the critical question — the real turning point. To 
what is this decrease in the quantity of labor owing 1 I 
answer deliberately, but without reserve, ' Mainly to causes 
which class under slavery, and not under freedom.' It is, 
for the most part, the result of those impolitic attempts to 
force the labor of freemen, which have disgusted the peas- 
antry, and have led to the desertion of many of the estates. 

"It is a cheering circumstance that the amount of plant- 
ing and other preparatory labor, bestowed on the estates 
during the autumn of 1839, has been much greater, by all 
accounts, than in the autumn of 1838. This is itself the 
effect of an improved understanding between the planters 
and the peasants ; and the result of it (if other circumstan- 



IS 

■ces be equal) cannot fail to be a considerable increase of 
produce in 1841. I am told, however, that there is one 
circumstance which may possibly prevent this result, as it 
regards sugar. It is, that the cultivation of it, under the 
old system, was forced on certain properties which, from 
their situation and other circumstances, were wholly unfit 
for the purpose. These plantations afforded an income to 
the local agents, but to the proprietors were either unpro- 
fitable, or losing, concerns. On such properties, under 
those new circumstances which bring all things to their 
true level, the cultivation ef sugar must cease. 

" In- the mean time, the imports of the island are rapidly 
increasing; trade improving ; the towns, thriving; new vil- 
lages rising in every direction ; property, much enhanced 
in value ; well-managed estates, productive and profitable ; 
expenses of management diminished ; short methods of la- 
bor adopted ; provisions cultivated on a larger scale than 
ever ; and the people, fv'herever they are properly treated, 
industrious, contented, and gradually accumulating wealth.' 
p. 132. 

" My narrative respecting the British West India Islands 
being now brought to a close, I will take the liberty of con- 
centrating and recapitulating the principal points of the 
subject, in a few distinct propositions. 

" 1st. The emancipated negroes are working well on the 
estates of their old masters. — Nor does Jamaica, when du- 
ly inspected and fairly estimated, furnish any exception to 
the general result. We find that, in that island, wherever 
the negroes are fairly, kindly, and wisely treated, there 
they are working well on the properties of their old mas- 
ters ; and that the existing instances of a contrary descrip- 
tion, must be ascribed to causes which class under slavery, 
and not under freedom. Let it not however be imagined, 
that the negroes, who are not working on the estates of 
their old masters, are on that account, idle. Even these, 
are in general, busily employed in cultivating their own 
grounds, in various descriptions of handicraft, in lime burn- . 
ing or fishing — in benefitting themselves and the commu- 
nity, through some new, but equally desirable medium.— 
Besides all this, stone walls ar& built, new houses erected, 



20 

p^astures cleaned, ditches dug, meadows drained, td&As 
made and macadamized, stores fitted up, villages formed* 
and other beneficial operations effected ; the whole of 
which, before emancipation, it would have been a folly evert 
to attempt. The old notion that the negro is, by constitu-" 
tion, a lazy creature who will do no work at all except hy 
compulsion, is now forever exploded." p. 137. 

" 2d. An increased quantity oi work thrown upon the 
market, is of course followed by the cheapening of labor.'* 
p. 138. 

" 3d. Real property has risen, and is rising in value. — • 
I wish it, however, to be understood, that the comparison 
is not here made with those olden times of slavery, when 
the soils of the islands were in their most prolific state, 
and the slaves themselves, of a corresponding value ; but 
with those days of de'pression and alarm, which preceded 
the act of emancipation. All that I mean to assert is, that 
landed property, in the British colonies, has touched the 
bottom, has found that bottom solid, has already risen con- 
siderably, and is now on a steady ascending march, to- 
wards the recovery of its highest value. One circumstance 
which greatly contributed to produce its depreciation, was 
the cry of interested persons who wished to run it down ; 
and the demand for it, which has risen among these very 
persons, is now restoring it to its rightful value. Remem- 
ber the old gentleman in Antigua, who is always complain- 
ing of the effects of freedom, and always buying landy 
p. 139. 

" 4th. The personal comforts of the laboring popula- 
tion, under freedom, are multiplied ten fold.'* p. 140. 

" 5th. Lastly, the moral and religious improvement of 
this people, under freedom, is more than equal to the in- 
crease of their comforts. Under this head, there are three 
points, deserving, respectively, of a distinct place in our 
memories. First, the rapid increase, and vast extent of ele- 
mentary and Christian education — schools for infants, young 
peisons, and adults, multiplying in every direction. Second- 
ly, the gradual, but decided diminution of crime, amount- 
ing, in many country districts, almost to its extinction.— 
Thirdly, the happy change of the general, and almost uni- 



21 

versal, practice of concubinage, for the equally general adop- 
tion of marriage. ' Concubinage,' says Dr. Stewart in his 
letter to me, ' the universal practice of the colored people, 
has wholly disappeared from amongst them. No young 
woman of color thinks of forming such connections now.' 
What is more, the improved morality of ihe blacks, is re- 
flecting itself on the white inhabitants — even the overseers 
are ceasing, one after another, from a sinful mode of life, 
and are forming reputable connections in marriage. But 
while these three points are confessedly of high importance, 
there is a fourth which at once embraces, and outweighs, 
them all — I mean the diffusion of vital Christianity. I 
know that great apprehensions were entertained — especially 
in this country — lest on the cessation of slavery, the ne- 
groes should break away at once from their masters, and 
their ministers. But freedom has come, and while their 
masters have not been forsaken, their religious teachers 
have become dearer to them than ever. Under the banner 
of liberty, the churches and meeiing-houses have been en- 
larged and multiplied, the attendance has become regular 
and devout, the congregations have, in many cases, been 
more than doubled — above all, the conversion of souls (as 
we have reason to believe) has been going on to an extent 
never before known in these colonies. In a religious point 
of view, as I have before hinted, the wilderness, in many 
places, has indeed begun to 'blossom as the rose.' 'In- 
stead of the thorn,' has ' come up the fir tree, and instead 
of the briar,' has ' come up the myrtle tree, and it shall be 
to the Lord fof a name — for an everlasting sign that shall 
not be cut off.' " p. 141. 

I have now given a few extracts from Mr. Gurney's 
book. They need no comment. Indeed, nothing can be 
said to convince or move the reader, if these simple re^ 
cords of Emancipation do not tind their way to his heart. 
In the whole history of efforts for human happiness, it is 
doubtful, if another example can be found of so great a 
revolution accomplished with so few sacrifices, and such 
immediate reward. Compare with this the American Re- 
.volution, which had for its end to shake off a yoke too 



22 

fight to be named by the side of domestic slavery. — 
Through what fields of blood and years of suffering, did 
we seek civil freedom, a boon insignificant in comparison 
with freedom from an owner's grasp ! It is the ordinary 
law of Providence, that great blessings shall be gained by 
great sacrifices, and that the most beneficial social changes 
shall bring immediate sufl[ering. That near a million of 
human beings should pass in a day from the deepest degra- 
dation to the rights of freemen, with so little agitation of 
the social system, is a fact so strange, that we naturally 
expect at first some tinging of the picture from the author's 
sympathies ; and we are brought to full conviction only by 
the simplicity and minuteness of his details. For one, I 
should have rejoiced in Emancipation as an unspeakable 
good, had the immediate results worn a much darker hue. 
I wanted only to know, that social order was preserved, that 
the laws were respected after Emancipation. I felt, that 
were anarchy escaped, no evil worse than slavery could 
take its place. I had not forgotten the doctrine of our fa- 
thers, that human freedom was worth vast sacrifices, that it 
could hardly be bought at too great a price. 

I proceed now to offer a few remarks on several topics 
suggested by Mr. Gurney's book, and I shall close by con- 
sidering the duties which belong to individuals and to the 
free States in relation to slavery. 

The first topic suggested by our author, and perhaps the 
most worthy of note, is his anxiety to show that Emancipa- 
tion has been accompanied with little pecuniary loss, that 
as a monied speculation it is not to be condemned. He 
evidently supposes, that he is writing for a people who will 
judge of this grand event in history by the standard of com- 
mercial profit or loss. In this view, his simple book tells 
more than a thousand satires against the spirit of our times. 
In speaking of West Indian Emancipation, it has been 
.common for men to say, We must wait for the facts ! And 
what facts have they waited for 1 They have waited to 
know, that the master, after fattening many years on op- 
pression, had lost nothing by the triumph of justice and 
humanity ; and that the slave, on being l^reed, was to yield 



23 

28 large an income as before to his employer. This delp- 
Gate sensibility to the rights of the wrong doer, this con- 
cern for property, this unconcern for human nature, is a 
sign of the little progress made even here by free princi- 
ples, and of men's ignorance of the great end of social 
union. 

Every good man must protest against this mode of set- 
tling the question of Emancipation. It seems to be taken 
for granted by not a few, that if, in consequence of this 
event, the crops have fallen off, or the number of coffee 
bags or sugar hogsheads is lessened, then Emancipation is 
to be pronounced a failure, and the great act of t^reeing a 
people from the most odious bondage, is to be set down a? 
Jolly. At the North and the South this base doctrine has 
seized on the public mind. It runs through our presses, 
not excepting the more respectable. The bright promises 
of Emancipation are too unimportant for our newspapers ;- 
but the fearful intelligence, that this or that island has 
shipped fewer hogsheads of sugar than in the days of sla- 
very, is thought worthy to be published far and wide, and 
Emancipation is a curse, because the civilized world must 
pay a few cents more to bring tea or coffee to the due de- 
gree of sweetness. It passes for an " ultraism" of philan- 
thropy, to prize a million of human beings above as many 
pounds of sugar. 

What is the great end of civilized society 1 Not coffee 
and sugar ; not the greatest possible amount of mineral, 
vegetable, or animal productions ; but the protection ot the 
rights of its members. I'he sacrifice of rights, especially of 
the dearest and most sacred, to increase of property, is one 
of the most flagrant crimes of the social state. That every 
man should have his due, not that a few proprieiors should 
riot on the toil, sweat, and blood of the many, this is ihe 
great design of the union of men into communities. Eman- 
cipation was not meant to increase the crops, but to restore 
to human beings their birthright, to give to every man the 
free use of his powers for his own and others' good. 

That the production of sugar would be diminished for a 
time, in consequence of Emancipation, was a thing to be 
expected if not desired. It i© in the sugar culture, that 



24 

ihe slaves, in the West Indies have been and are most 
overworked. In Cuba we are told by men, who have' 
given particular attention to that island, that the mortality 
on the sugar estates is ten per cent annually, so that a 
whole gang is used up, swept off in ten years. Suppose 
Emancipation introduced into Cuba. Would not the pro- 
duction of sugar be diminished 1 Ought not every man tff 
desire the diminution 1 I do not say that such atrocious- 
cruelty was common in the British Islands. But it was in 
this department chiefly, that the slaves were exposed W 
excessive toil. It was to be expected then, that, when 
left free, they would prefer other modes of industry. Ac- 
cordingly whilst the sugar is diminished, the ordinary arti- 
cles of subsistence have increased. Some of the slaves 
have become small farmers, and many more, who hire 
themselves as laborers, cultivate small patches of land on 
their account. There is another important consideration. 
Before freedom, the women formed no inconsiderable part 
of the gangs who labored on the sugar crops. These are 
now very much if not wholly withdrawn. Is it a grief to a 
man, who has the spirit of a man, that woman's burdens 
are made lighter ■? Other causes of the diminution of the 
sugar crop may be found in Mr. Gurney's book ; but these 
are enough to show us, that this effect is due in part to the 
good working of Emancipation, to a relief of the male and 
female slave, in which we ought to rejoice. 

Before Emancipdtion I expected that the immediate re- 
sult of the measure would be more or less idleness, conse- 
quently a diminution of produce. How natural was it to 
anticipate, that men who had worked under the lash, and 
had looked on exemption from toil as the happiness of 
paradise, should surrender themselves more or less to sloth 
on becoming their own masters. It is the curse of a bad 
system to unfit men at first for a better. That the paraly- 
zing effect of slavery should continue after its extinction, 
that the slave should at the first produce less than before, 
this surely is no matter of wonder. The wonder is, and it 
is a great one, that the slaves in the West Indies have, in 
their new condition, been so greatly influenced by the mo- 
tives of freemen ; that the spirit of industry has so far sur- 



25 

viveJ the system of compulsion under which they had been 
trained ; that ideas of a better mode of living have taken 
so strong a hold on their minds ; that so many refined 
tastes and wants have been so soon developed. Here is 
the wonder ; and all this shows, what we have often heard, 
that the negro is more susceptible of civilization from 
abroad than any other race of men. That some, perhaps 
many of the slaves, have worked too little, is not to be de- 
nied, nor can we blame them much for it. All of us, I sus^' 
pect, under like circumstances would turn our first freedom' 
into a holiday. Besides, when we think, that they have 
been sweating and bleeding to nourish in all manner of 
luxury a few indolent proprietors, they do not seem very in- 
excusable for a short emulation of their superiors. The 
negro sleeping all day under the shade of the palm tree^ 
ought not to offend our moral sense, much more than the 
" owner" stretched on his ottoman or sofa. What ought 
to astonish us is the limitation, not the existence of the 
evil. 

It is to be desired, that those among us, who groan over 
Emancipation, because the staples of the island are dimin- 
ished, should be made to wear for a few months the yoke of 
slavery, so as to judge experimentally whether freedom is 
worth or not a few hogsheads of sugar. If knowing what 
this yoke is, they are willing that others should bear it,- 
they deserve themselves above others to be crushed by it. 
Slavery is the greatest of wrongs, the most intolerable of 
all the forms of oppression. We of this country thought, 
that to be robbed of political liberty was an injury not to be 
endured ; and, as a people, were ready to shed our blood 
like water to avert it. But political liberty is of no worth 
compared with personal ; and slavery robs men of the lat- 
ter. Under the despotisms of modern Europe, the people, 
though deprived of political freedom, enjoy codes of laws 
constructed with great care, the fruits of the wisdom of 
ages, Tvhich recognize the sacredness of the rights of person 
and property, and under which those rights are essentially- 
secure. A subject of these despotisms may still be a man, 
may better his condition, may enrich his intellect, may fill 
ihe earth with his fame. He enjoys essentially personal 



26 

freedom, and through this accomplishes the great ends o-i 
his being. To be stripped of this blessing, to be owned by 
a fellow creature, to hold our limbs and faculties as another's 
property, to be subject every moment to another's will, to 
stand in awe of another's lash, to have our whole energies 
chained to never varying tasks for another's luxury, to hold 
wife and children at another's pleasure, — what wrong can 
be compared with this 1 This is such an insult on human 
nature, such an impiety towards the common Father, that 
the whole earth should send up one cry of reprobation 
against it ; and yet we are told, this outrage must continue, 
lest the market of the civilized world should be deprived of 
some hogsheads of sugar. 

It is hard to weigh human rights against each other ; 
they are all sacred and invaluable. But there is no one 
vvhich nature, instinct, makes so dear to us as the right of 
action, of free motion ; the right of exerting, and by exer- 
tion enlarging our laculties of body and mind ; the right of 
forming plans, of directing our powers according to our 
convictions of interest and duty ; the right of puttmg forth 
our energies from a spring in our own breasts. Self-mo- 
tion, this is what our nature hungers and thirsts for as its 
true element and life. In truth, every thing that lives, the 
bird, the insect, craves and delights in freedom of action ; 
and much more must this be the instinct of a rational mo- 
ral creature of God, who can attain by such freedom alone 
to the proper strength and enjoyment of his nature. The 
rights of property and reputation are poor compared with 
this. Of what worth would be the products of the universe 
to a man forbidden to use his limbs, or shut up in a prison 1 
To be deprived of that freedom of action which consists 
with others' freedom ; to be forbidden to exert our faculties 
for our own good ; to be cut off from enterprise ; to have 
a narrow circle drawn round us and to be kept wit.hin it by 
a spy and a lash ; to meet an iron barrier in another's sel- 
fish will, let impulse or desire turn where it may ; to be 
systematically denied the means of cultivating the powers 
which distinguish us from the brute ;— this is to be wound- 
ed not only in the dearest earthly interests, but in the very 
life of the soul. Our humanity pines and dies rather than 



27 

lives in this unnatural restraint. Now it is the very es- 
sence of slavery to prostrate this right of action, of self- 
motion, not indirectly or uncertainly, but immediately and 
without disguise ; and is this right to be weighed in the 
scales against sugar and cotfee ? and are eight hundred 
thousand human beings to be robbed of it to increase the 
luxuries of the world \ 

What matters it, that the staples of the ^\^est Indians 
are diminished ? Do the people there starve "? Are they 
driven by want to robbery] Has the negro passed from 
the hands of the overseer into those of the hangman ? We 
learn from i\Ir. Gurnev that the prophecies of ruin to the 
West Indies are fulfilled chiefly in regard lo the prisons. 
These are in some places falling to decay and every where 
have fewer inmates. And what makes this result more 
striking is, that since Emancipation, many offences, former- 
ly punished summarily by the master on the plantation, 
now fall under the cognizance of the magistrate, and are of 
course punishable by imprisonment. Do the freed slaves 
want clothing 1 Do rags form the Standard of Emancipa- 
tion ] We hear not oidy of decent apparel, but are told 
that negro vanity, hardly surpassed by that of the white 
dandy, suffers nothing for want of decoration or fashionable 
attire. This is not a sign, that the people fare the worse 
for freedom. Enough is produced to give subsistence to 
an improved and cheerful population, and vvhat more can 
we desire 1 In our sympathy with the rich proprietor, shall 
we complain of a change, which has secured to every man 
his rights, and to thousands, once trodden under foot, the 
comforts of life and the means of intellectual and moral 
progress'? Is it nothing that the old unfurnished hut of 
the slave is in many spots giving place to the comfortable 
cottage 1 Is it nothing, that in these cottages marriage is 
an indissoluble tie 1 that the mother presses her child to 
her heart as indeed her own 1 Is it nothing, that churches 
are springing up, not from the donations of the opulent, but 
from the hard earnings of the religious poor 1 What if a 
few owners of sugar estates export less than formerly 1 
Are the many always to be sacrificed to the few 1 Sup- 
pose the luxuries of the splendid mansion to be retrenched. 



28 

Is it no compensation that the comforts of the laborer's hut 
3.re increased] Emancipation was resisted on the ground, 
that the slave, if restored to his rights, would fall into idle- 
ness and vagrancy, and even relapse into barbarism. But 
the emancipated negro discovers no indifference to the 
comforts of civilized life. He has wants various enough 
to keep him in action. His standard of living has risen. 
He desires a better lodging, dress, and food. He has begun 
too to thirst for accumulation. As Mr. Gurney says, " he 
understands his interest as well as a yankee." He is more 
likely to fall into the civilized man's cupidity than into the 
sloth and filth of a savage. Is it an offset for all these 
benefits, that the custom house reports a diminution of the 
staples of slavery 1 

What a country most needs, is not an increase of its ex- 
ports, but the well being of all classes of its population 
and especially of the most numerous class ; and these 
things are not one and the same. It is a striking fact, that 
while the exports of the emancipated islands have decrea- 
sed, the imports are greater than before. In Jamaica, du- 
ring slavery, the industry of the laborers was given chiefly 
to a staple, which was sent to absentee proprietors, who 
expended the proceeds very much in a luxurious life in Eng- 
land. At present, not a little of this industry is employed 
on articles of subsistence and comfort for the working class 
and their families ; and, at the same time, such an amount 
of labor is sold by this class to the planter, and so fast are 
they acquiring a taste for better modes of living, that they 
need and can pay for great imports from the mother coun- 
try. Surely when we see the fruits of industry diffusing 
themselves more and more through the mass of a commu- 
nity, finding their way to the very hovel, and raising the 
multitude of men to new civilization and self respect, we 
cannot grieve much, even though it should appear, that on 
the whole the amount of exports or even of products is de- 
creased. It is not the quantity, but the distribution, the use 
of products, which determines the prosperity of a state. 
For example, were the grain, which is now grown among 
us for distillation, annually destroyed by fire, or were every 
flhip, freighted with distilled liquors, to sink on approaching 



29 

our shores, so that the crew might be saved, how immense* 
ly would the happiness, honor, and real strength of the 
country be increased by the loss, even were this not to be 
replaced, as it soon would be, by the springing up of a new, 
virtuous industry now excluded by intemperance. So were 
the labor and capital now spent on the importation of per- 
nicious luxuries, to be employed in the intellectual, moral, 
and religious culture of the whole people, how immense 
would be the gain, in every respect, though for a short lime 
material products were diminished. A better age will look 
back with wonder and scorn on the misdirected industry of 
the present times. The only sure sign of public prosperi- 
ty is, that the mass of the people are steadily multiplying 
the comforts of life and the means of improvement ; and 
where this takes place, we need not trouble ourselves 
about exports or products. 

I am not very anxious to repel the charges against Eman- 
cipation of diminishing the industry of the island, though 
It has been much exaggerated. Allow that the freed slaves 
work less. Has man nothing to do but work 1 Are 
not too many here overworked 1 If a people can live 
with comfort on less toil, are they not to be envied 
rather than condemned 1 What a happiness would it be, if we 
here, by anew wisdom, a new temperance, and a new spirit of 
brotherly love, could cease to be the care-worn drudges 
which so many in all classes are, and could give a greater 
portion of life to thought, to refined social intercourse, to 
the enjoyment of the beauty which God spreads over the 
universe, to works of genius and art, to communion with 
our Creator 1 Labor connected with and aiding such a 
life would be noble. How much of it is thrown away on 
poor, superficial, degrading gratifications ! 

We hear the condition of Hayti deplored, because the 
people are so idle and produce so little for exportation. 
Many look back to the period, when a few planters drove 
thousands of slaves to the cane-field and sugar-mill, in or- 
der to enrich themselves and secure to their families 
the luxurious ease so coveted in tropical climes ; and they 
sigh over the change which has taken place. I look on the 
change with very different feelings. The negroes in that 



30 

luxuriant island liave increased to above a million. By 
slight toil they obtain the comforts of life. Their homes 
are sacred. Their little property in a good degree secure. 
They live together peaceably. So little inclined are they 
to violence, that the large amount of specie paid by the 
government to France, as the price of independence, have 
been transported through the country on horseback, with 
comparatively no defence, and with a safety which no one 
would be mad enough to expect under such circumstances, 
in what are called civilized lands. It is true, their enjoy- 
ments are animal in a great degree. They live much like 
neglected children, making little or no progress, making life 
one long day of unprofitable ease. I should rejoice to raise 
them from children into men. But when I contrast this 
tranquil, unoffending life with the horrors of a slave plan- 
tation, it seems to me a paradise. What matters it that 
they send next to no coffee or sugar to Europe"! How 
much better, that they should stretch themselves in the 
heat of the day under their gracefully waving groves, than 
sweat and bleed under an overseer for others' selfish ease ! 
Hayti has one curse, and that is not freedom, but tyranny. 
Her President for life is a despot under a less ominous 
name. Her government, indifferent or hostile to the im- 
provement of the people, is sustained by a standing army, 
•which undoubtedly is an instrument of oppression. But in 
so simple a form of society, despotism is not that organized 
robbery which has flourished in the civilized world. Un- 
doubtedly in this rude state of things, the laws are often 
unwise, partial, and ill administered. I have no taste for 
this childish condition of society. Still I turn with plea- 
sure from slavery to the thought of a million of fellow-be- 
ings, little instructed indeed, but enjoying ease and comfort, 
under that beautiful sky and on the bosom of that exhaust- 
less soil. In one respect Hayti is infinitely advantaged by 
her change of condition. Under slavery, her colored popu- 
lation, that is, the mass of her inhabitants had no chance of 
rising, could make no progress in intelligence and in the 
arts and refinements of life. They were doomed to per- 
petual degradation. Under freedom their improvement is 
possible. They are placed within the reach of meliorating 



31 

influences. Their intercourse with other nations, and the 
opportunities afforded to many among them of bettering 
their condition, furnish various means and incitements to 
progress. If the Catholic church, which is rendering at 
this moment immense aid to civilization and pure morals in 
Ireland, were to enter in earnest on the work of enlighten- 
ing and regenerating Hayti, or if) (what I should greatly 
prefer,) any other church couU have free access to the peo- 
ple, this island might in a short time become an important 
accession to the Christian and civilized world, and the dark 
«loud which hangs aver the first years of her freedom 
would vanish before the brightness of her later history. 

My maxim is, " Any thing bjit slavey 1 Poverty sooner 
than slavery !'' Suppose that we of this good city of Bos- 
ton were summoned to choose between living on bread and 
water and such a state of things as existed in the West Indies, 
Suppose that the present wealth of our metropolis could be 
continued only on the condition, that five thousand of our 
eighty thousand inhabitants should live as princes, and the 
-rest of us be reduced to slavery to sustain the luxury of 
our masters. Should we not all crv out Give us the bread 
■and water ; Would we not rather see our fair city levelled 
10 the earth, and choose to work out slowly for ourselves 
and our children a better lot, than stoop our necks to the 
yoke? So we all feel, when the case is brought home to 
•ourselves. What should we say to the man, who should 
stn've to terrify us by prophecies of diminished products and 
exports, into the substitution of bondage for the character 
of freemen. 

In the preceding remarks I have insisted that Emanci- 
pation is not to be treated as a question of profit and loss 
that its merits are not to be settled by its influence on the 
master's gains. Mr. Gurney, however, maintains, that the 
master has nothing to fear, that real estate has risen, that 
free labor costs less than that of the slave. All this is 
good news and should be spread through the land ; for 
men are especially inclined to be just, when they can serve 
themselves by justice. But Emancipation rests on higher 
ground than the mast.er's accumulation, even on the rights 



33 

and essential interests of the slave. And let these he 
held sacred, though the luxury of the master be retrenched. 

2. I have now finished my remarks on a topic which was 
always present to the mind of our author — the alledged de- 
crease of industry and exports since Emancipation. The 
next topic to which I sVall turn, is his notice of slavery in. 
Cuba. He only touched at this Island, but evidently recei- 
ved the same sad impression which we received from 
those who have had longer lime for observation. He 
says : 

" Of one feature in the slave trade and slavery of Cuba, 
I had no knowledge until I was on the spot. The importa- 
tion consists almost entirely of men, and we were inform- 
ed that on many of the estates, not a single female is to 
be found. Natural increase is disregarded. The Cubans 
import the stronger animals, like bullocks, work them up, 
and then seek a fresh supply. This surely is a system of 
most unnatural barbarity." 

This barbarity is believed to be unparalleled. The young 
African, torn from home and his native shore, is brought 
to a plantation, where he is never to no a home. All the 
relations of domestic life are systematically denied him. 
"Woman's countenance he is not to look upon. The 
child's voice, he is no more to hear. His owner finds it 
more gainful to import than to breed slaves ; and still more 
has made the sad discovery, that it is cheaper to " work up" 
the servile laborer in his youth and to replace him bj a 
new victim, than to let him grow old in moderate toil. I 
have been told by some of the most recent travellers in 
Cuba who gave particular attention to the subject,* that in 

* My accounts from Cuba have been received from Dr. Madden 
and David Turnbuli.Esq ; the former, one of the British commission- 
ers, resident at Havana to enforce the treaty with Spain in relation 
to the slave trade; the latter, a gentleman who visited Cuba 
chiefly if not solely to enquire into slavery. IVIr. TurnbuH's account 
of Ciiba, in his " Travels in the West," deserves to be read. The 
reports of such men. confirmed in a very important particular by 
Mr. Gurney, have an authority, which obliges me to speak as I have 
done of the slave-system of this i. land. If indeed (what is most 
unlikely,) they have fallen into errors on the subject, these can 
easily be exposed, and 1 shall rejoice in being the means of bring- 
ing out the truth. 



?3 

the sugar making season, the slaves are generally alloweti 
but four out of the twenty-four hours, for sleep. From 
these too I learned, that a gang o'f slaves is used up in ten 
years. Of the young men imported from Africa, one out 
of ten dies yearly. To supply this enormous waste of life, 
above twenty-five thousand slaves are imported from Africat, 
in vessels so crowded, that sometimes one quarter, some- 
times one half, of the wretched creatures bought in Africa 
■perish in agony before reaching land. It is to be feared, 
that Cuban slavery, traced from the moment when the 
African, touches the deck, to the happier moment when 
he finds his grave on the ocean or the plantation, in- 
cludes an amount of crime and misery not to be par- 
alleled in any porton of the globe civilized or savage. 
And there ar-e more reasons than one why I would bring 
this horrid picture before the minds of my countrymen. 
We, We, do much to sustain this system of horror and blood. 
The Cuban slave trade is carried on in vessels built espe- 
cially for this use in American ports- These vessels often 
sail under the American flag, and are aided by American 
merehant-men, and, as is feared, by American capital. 
And this is not all ; the sugar, in producing of which so 
many of our fellow creatures perish miserably, is shipped 
in great quantities to this country. We are the custom- 
ers, who stimulate by our demands this infernal cruelty. 
And knowing this, shall we become accessories to the mur- 
■der of our brethren, by continuing to use the fruit of the 
hard-wrung toil which destroys them ? The sugar of Cuba 
comes to us drenched with human blood. So we 
ought to see it and to turn from it with loathing. The 
guilt which produces it, ought to be put down by 
the spontaneous, instinctive horror of the civilized world. 
There is another fact worthy attention. It is said, that 
most of the plantations in Cuba, which have been recent- 
ly brought under cultivation, belong to Americans, that the 
number of American slaveholders is increasing rapidly on 
the Island, and consequently that the importation of human 
cargoes from Africa finds much of its encouragement from 

t There are different estimates of the number, some making it 
fi^ch greater thaa the text. 



34 

,the citizens of our republic. It is not easy to speak in mea- 
Bured terms of this enormity. For men born and brought 
up amidst slavery many apologies may be made But men, 
born beyond tlic sound oi the lash, brought up where hu- 
man rights are held sacred, who, in face of all the light 
thrown now on slavery, can still deal in human flesh, can 
become customers of the " felon " who tears the African 
from his native shore, and can with open eyes inflict this 
deepest wrong for gain and gain alone — such " have no 
clodk for their sin." Men so hard of heait, so steeled against 
the reproofs of conscience, so intent on thriving though it 
be by the most cruel wrongs, are not to be touched by hu- 
man expostulation and rebuke. But if any should tremble 
before Almighty justice, ought not the%j ? 

There is another reason for dvvelling on this topic. It 
teaches us the little reliance to be placed on the impressions 
respecting slavery brought home by superficial observers. 
"We have seen what slavery is in Cuba ; and yet men of 
high character from this country, who have visited that 
island, have returned to tell us of the mildness of the sys- 
tem. Men, who would cut off their right hand, sooner 
than withdraw the sympathy of others from human suffer- 
ing, have virtually done so, by their representation of the 
kindly working of slavery on the very spot where it exists 
with peculiar horrors. They have visited some favored 
plantation, been treated with hospitality, seen no tortures, 
heard no shrieks, and then come home to reprove those 
who set forth indignantly the wrongs of the slave. And 
what is true with regard to the visitors of the West Indies, 
applies to those who visit our southern states. Having 
witnessed slavery in the families of some of the most en- 
lightened and refined inhabitants, they return to speak of it 
as no very fearful thing. Had they inquired about the state 
of society through the whole country, and learned that more 
than one fourth of the inhabitants cannot write their own 
names, they would have forborne to make a few selected 
families the representative of the community, and might 
have believed in the possibility of some of the horrid de- 
tails recorded in " Slavery as it is." For myself, I do not 
think it worth my while to inquire into the merits of sU-« 



35 

Very in this or that region. It is enough for me to ktiaW) 
that one human being holds other human beings as his pro- ' 
perty, subject to his arbitrary and irresponsible will, and 
compels them to toil for his luxury and ease. I know 
enough of men, to know what the workings of such a sys- 
tem on a large scale must be ; and I liold my understand- 
ing insulted when men talk to me of its humanity. If 
there be one truth of history taught more plainly than any 
other, it is the tendency of human nature to abuse power. 
To protect ourselves against power, to keep this in perpetual 
check by dividing it among many hands, by limiting its du- 
ration, by dehning its action with sharp lines, by watching 
it jealously, by holding it responsible for abuses, this is the 
grand aim and benefit of the Social institutions, which are' 
our chief boast. Arbitrary, unchecked power, is the evil 
against which all e.xpenence cries out so loudly, that apolo- 
gies for it may be dismissed without a hearing. But admit- 
the plea of its apologists. Allow slavery to be ever so hu- 
mane. Grant that the man who owns me, is ever so kind. 
The wrong of him who presumes to talk of owning me is- 
too unmeasured to be softened by kindness. There are 
wrongs which can be redeemed by no kindness. Because 
a man treads on me with velvet foot, must I be content to 
grovel in the earth. Because he gives me meat as well as 
bread, whilst he takes my child and sells it into a land 
where my chained limbs cannot follow, must I thank him 
for his kindness ■? I do not envy those who think slavery 
no very pitiable lot, provided its nakedness be covered and 
its hunger regularly a])peased. 

It is worthy of consideration, that the slave's lot does not 
improve with the advance of what is called civilization, that 
is, of trade and luxuries. Slavery is such a violation of na- 
ture, that it is an exception to the general law of progress. 
In rude states of society, when men's wants and employ- 
ments are few, and trade and other means of gain hardly 
exist, tne slave leads a comparatively easy life ; he par- 
takes of the general indolence. He lives in the family much 
as a member, and is oppressed by no great disparity of rank. 
But when society advances, and wants muiliply, and the 
lust of gain springs up, and prices increase, the slave's lot 



36 

grows harder. He is viewed more and more as a machma" 
to be used for profit, and is tasked like the beast of burden. 
The distance between him and his master increases, and he 
has less and less of the spirit of a man. He may have bet- 
ter food, hut it is that he may work the more. He may be 
whipped less passionately or frequently ^ but it is, because 
the never varying routine of toil and the more skilful disci-- 
plme which civilization teaches, have subdued him more 
completely. Thus to the slave it is no gain that the com- 
munity grow richer and more luxurious. He has an interest 
in the return of society to barbarism, for in this case he 
would come nearer the general level. He would escape 
the peculiar ignominy and accumulated burdens which he 
has to bear in civilized life. 

3. I pass to another topic suggested by Mr. Gurney's 
book. What is it, let me ask, which has freed the West 
India slave, and is now raishig him to the dignity of a man T 
The answer is most cheering. The great Enaancipator has- 
been Christianity. Policy, interest, state-crat't, church-- 
craft, the low motives which have originated other revolu- 
tions, have not worked here. From the times of CWkson- 
and Wilberforce, down to the present day, the friends of the- 
slave, who have pleaded his cause and broken his chains^ 
have been Christians ; and it is from Christ the divine phi- 
lanthropist, from the inspiration of his cross, that they have 
gathered faith, hope, and love for the conflict. This illus- 
tration of the spirit and power of Christianity, is a bright 
addition to the evidences of its truth. We have here the- 
miracle af a great nation, rising in its strength,, not for con- 
quest, not to assert its own rights, but to free and elevate- 
the most despised and injured race on earth ; and as this 
stands alone in human history, so it recalls to us those won- 
derful works of mercy and power, by which- the divinity of 
our religion was at first confirmed. 

It is with deep sorrow that I am compelled to turn tothe 
contrast between religion in England and religion in Ame- 
rica. There it vindicates the cause of the oppressed. Here 
it rivets the chain a.id hardens the heart of the oppressor. 
At the South, what is the Christian ministry doing for the 
■laT§ 1 Teaching the rightfulness of his yoke^ joining ift 



37 

the cry against the men who plead for his freedom, giving 
the sanction of God's name to the greatest offence against 
his children. This is the saddest view, presented by the 
conflict with slavery. The very men, whose office it is to 
plead against all wrong, to enforce the obligation of impar- 
tial, inflexible justice, to breathe the spirit of universal bro- 
therly love, to resist at all hazards the spirit and evil cus- 
toms of the world, to live and to die under the banner of 
Christian truth, have enlisted under the standard of slavery. 
Had they merely declined to bring the subject into the 
Church, on the ground of the presence of the slave, they 
would have been justified. Had they declmed to discuss 
it through the press and in conversation, on the ground that 
the public mind was too furious to bear the truth, they 
would have been approved by multitudes ; though it is wisest 
for the minister to resign his office, when it can only be ex- 
ercised under menace and unrighteous restraint, and to go 
where with unsealed lips he may teach and enforce human 
duty in its full extent. But the ministers at the South have 
not been content with silence. The majority of them are 
understood to have given their support to slavery, to have 
thrown their weight into the scale of the master. That 
in so doing, they have belied their clear convictions, that 
they have preached known falsehood, we do not say. Few 
ministers of Christ, we trust, can teach what their delibe- 
rate judgments condemn. But in cases like the present, 
how common is it for the judgment to receive a shape and 
hue from self-interest, from private aflfection, from the ty- 
ranny of opinion and the passions of the multitude ! Few 
ministers, we trust, can sin against clear, steady light. But 
how common is it for the mind to waver and to be obscured 
in regard to scorned and persecuted truth ! When we look 
beyond the bounds of slavery, we find the civilized and chris- 
tian world with few exceptions reprobating slavery, as at 
war with the precepts and spirit of Christ. But at the South, 
his ministers sustain it as consistent with justice, equity, 
and disinterested love. Can we help saying, that the loud, 
menacing, popular voice has proved too strong for the ser- 
vants of Christ ] 
We hoped better things than this, because the prevalent 
d 



38 

sects at the South are the Methodists and Baptists, and ihts& 
were expected to be less tainted by a worldly spirit, than 
other denominations in which luxury and fashion bear great- 
er sway. Uut the Methodists, forgetful of their great foun- 
der, who cried aloud against slavery and spared not ; and 
the Baptists, forgetful of the sainted name of Roger Wil- 
liams, whose love of the despised Indian, and whose martyr 
spirit should have taught them fearless sympathy with the 
negro, have been found in the ranks of the foes of freedom 
Indeed their allegiance to slavery seems to know no bounds. 
A Baptist association at the South decreed, that a slave,, 
sold at a distance from his wife, might marry again in obe- 
dience to his master ; and that he would even do wrong, icr 
disobey in this particular. Thus one of the plainest pre- 
cepts of Christianity has been set at nought. Thus the poor 
slave is taught to renounce his wife, however dear, to rup- 
ture the most sacred social tie, that, like the other animals, 
he may keep up the stock of the estate. The general Me- 
thodist Conference during this very year, have decreed, that 
the testimony of a colored member of their churches should 
not be received against a white member, who may be on 
trial before an ecclesiastical tribunal. Thus, in church af- 
fairs, a multitude of disciples of Jesus Christ, who have 
been received into Christian communion on the ground of 
their spiritual regeneration, who belong, as is believed, to 
the church on earth and in Heaven, are put down by their 
brethren as incapable of recognizing the obligation of truth, 
of performing the most common duty of morality, and are 
denied a privilege conceded, in worldly affairs, to the most 
depraved. Thus the religion of the South, heaps insult and 
injury on the slave. 

And what have the Christians of the North done ? We 
rejoice to say, that from these have gone forth not a few 
testimonies against slavery. Not a few ministers in asso- 
ciations, conventions, presbyteries or conferences, have de- 
clared the inconsistency of the sy.5tem with the principles 
of Christianity, and with the law of love. Still the churches 
and' congregations of the free States, have-in the main look- 
ed coldly on the subject, and discouraged too effectualiy the- 
h^9 expression of thought and feeling in regard t-oit by ths- 



39 

religious teacher. Under that legislation of public opinion^ 
which, without courts or offices, sways more despotically 
than Czars or Sultans, the pulpit and the press, have, in no 
small degree, been reduced to silence as to slavery, espe- 
cially in cities, the chief seats of this invisible power. Some 
fervent spirits among us, seeing religion, m this and other 
cases, so ready to bend to worldly opinion, have been filled 
with indignation. They have spoken of Christianity, as 
having no life here, as a beautiful corpse, laid out in much 
state, worshipped with costly homage, but worshipped very 
much as were the prophets, whose tombs were so ostenta- 
tiously garnished in the times of the Savior. But this is 
unjust.' Christianity lives and acts among us. It imposes 
many salutary restraints. It inspires many good deeds. 
There are not a few, in whom it puts forth a power, worthy 
of its better days, and the number of such is growing. Let 
us not be ungrateful for what this religion is doing, nor shut 
our ears against the prophecies which the present gives of 
its future triumphs Still, as a general rule, the Christianity 
of this day falls fearfully short of the Christianity of the im- 
mediate followers of our Lord. Then the meaning of a 
Christian was, that he took the cross and followed Christ, 
that he counted not his life dear to him in the service of 
God and man, that he trod the world under his feet. Now 
we ask leave of the world, how far we shall follow Christ. 
What wrong or abuse is there, which the bulk of the peo- 
ple may think essential to their prosperity and may defend 
with outcry and menace, before which the Christianity of 
this age will not bow ] We need a new John, who, with 
the untamed and solemn energy of the wilderness, shall cry 
out among us, Repent. We need that the Crucified should 
speak to us with a more startling voice, " He that forsaketh 
not all things, and followeth me, cannot be my disciple." 
We need that the all-sacrificing, all-sympathising spirit of 
Christianity, should cease to bow to the spirit of the world. 
We need that, under a deep sense of want and wo, the 
church should cry out, " Thy kingdom come, and with holy 
importunity should bring down new strength, and life, and 
love from Heaven. 

4. I pass to another topic, suggested by Mr. Gurney's 



40 

hook. According to this and all the books written on the 
subject, emancipation has borne a singular testimony to the 
noble elements of the negro character. It may be doubted 
whether any other race would have borne this trial, as well 
as they. Before the day of freedom came, the West In- 
dies and this country foreboded fearful consequences from 
the sudden transition of such a multitude from bondage to 
liberty. Revenge, massacre, unbridled lust, were to usher 
in the grand festival of emancipation, which was to end in 
the breaking out of a new Pandemonium on earth. Instead 
of this, the holy day of liberty was welcomed by shouts 
and tears of gratitude. The liberated negroes did not hast- 
en as Saxon serfs in like circumstances might have done, to 
haunts of intoxication, but to the house of God. Their 
rude churches were thronged. Their joy found utterance 
m prayers and hymns. History contains no record more 
touching than the account of the religious, tender thankful- 
ness which this vast boon awakened in the negro breast. — 
And what followed 1 Was this beautiful emotion an evan- 
escent transport, soon to give way to ferocity and ven- 
geance 1 It was natural for masters, who had inflicted 
causeless stripes, and filled the cup of the slaves with bit- 
terness, to fear their rage after liberation. But the over- 
whelming joy of freedom having subsided, they returned to 
labor. Not even a blow was struck in the excitement of 
that vast change. No violation of the peace required the 
interposition of the magistrate. The new relation was as- 
sumed easily, quietly, without an act of violence ; and, 
since that time, in the short space of two years, how much 
have they accomplished 1 Beautiful villages have grown 
up. Little freeholds have been purchased. The marriage 
tie has become sacred. The child is educated. Crime has 
diminished. There are islands, where a greater proportion 
of the young are trained in schools, than among the whites 
of the slave States. I ask, whether any other people on 
the face of the earth, would have received and used the in- 
finite blessing of liberty so well. 

The history of West India Emancipation teaches us that 
we are holding in bondage one of the best races of the hu- 
man family. The negro is among the mildest, gentlest of 



41 

ttien. He is singularly susceptible of improvement from 
abroad His children, it is said, receive more rapidly than 
ours, the elements of knowledge. Hovv far he can origi- 
nate improvements, time only can teach. His nature is 
-affectionate, easily touched ; and hence he is more open to 
religious impressions than the white man. The European 
race have manifested mure courage, enterprise, invention ; 
•but in the dispositions which Christianity particularly ho- 
nors, how inferior are they to the African ! When I cast 
my eyes over our southern region, the land of bowie-knives, 
lynch law, and duels, of " chivalry," honor, and revenge ; 
and when I consider that Christianity is declared to be a 
spirit of charity, " which seeketh not its own, is not easily 
provoked, thinketh no evil and endureth all things," and is 
also declared to be, " the wisdom from above, which is first 
pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of 
mercy and good fruits ;" can I hesitate in deciding to which 
of the races in that land Christianity is most adapted, and 
in which its noblest disciples are most likely to be reared ] 
It may be said, indeed, of all the European nations, that 
they are distinguished by qualities opposed to the spirit of 
Christianity ; and it is one of the most remarkable events 
of history, that the religion of Jesus should have struck 
root among them. As yet it has not subdued them. The 
" law of honor," the strongest of all laws in the European 
race, is, to this day, directly hostile to the character and 
word of Christ. The African carries within him, much 
more than we, the germs of a meek, long-suffering, loving 
virtue. A short residence among the negroes in the West 
Indies impressed me with their capacity of improvement. 
On all sides I heard of theu: religious tendencies, the noblest 
in human nature. I saw, too, on the plantation where I re- 
sided, a gracefulness and dignity of form and motion, rare 
in my own native New England. And this is the race 
which has been selected to be trodden down and confounded 
with the brutes ! Undoubtedly the negroes are debased ; 
for were slavery not debasing, I should have little quarrel 
with it. But let not their degradation be alledged in proof 
of peculiar incapacity of moral elevation. They are given 
to theft ; but there is no peculiar aggravated guilt, in steal- 
d* 



42 

ing from those by whom they are robbed of all their rights 
and their very persons. They are given to falsehood ; but 
this is the very effect produced by oppression on the Irish 
peasantry. They are undoubtedly sensual ; and yet the 
African countenance seldom shows that coarse, brutal sen- 
suality, which is so common in the face of the white man. 
I should expect from the African race, if civilized, less en- 
ergy, less courage, le&s intellectual originality than in our 
race, but more amiableness, tranquillity, gentleness, and 
content. They might not rise to an equality in outward 
condition, but would probably be a much happier race.^» 
There is no reason for holding such a race in chains ; they 
need no chain to make them harmless.* 

In the remarks now made, I have aimed only to express 
my sympathy with the wronged. As to the white popula- 
tion of the South, I have no intention to disparage it I 
have no undue partiality to the North ; for I believe, that 
were northern men slaveholders, and satisfied that they 
could grow richer by slave than by free labor, not a few 
would retain their property in human flesh with as resolute 
and furious a grasp as their southern brethren. In truth, 
until the cotton culture had intoxicated the minds of the 
South with golden dreams, that part of the country seemed 
less tainted by cupidity than our own. The character of 
that region is still a mixed one, impulsive, passionate, vin- 
dictive, sensual ; but frank, courageous, self-relying, enthu- 
siastic, and capable of great sacrifices for a friend. Could 
the withering influence of slavery be withdrawn, the south- 
ern character, though less consistent, less based on princi- 
ple, would be more attractive and lofty than that of the 
North. The South is fond of calling itself Anglo-Saxon. 
Judging from character, I should say that this name belongs 
much more to the North, the country of steady, persevennor, 
unconquerable energy. Our southom brethren remind me 
more of the Normans. They seem to have in their veins 
the burning blood of that pirate race, who spread terror 
through Europe, who seized part of France as a prey, and 
then pounced on England ; a conquering, chivalrous rae©; 

* See note at the ead. 



43 

ftotn which most of the nobler families of England are said 
to be derived. There were certainly noble traits in the 
Norman character, such as its enthusiasm, its defiance of 
peril by sea and land, its force of will, its rude sense of 
honor. But the man of Norman spirit, or Norman blood, 
should never be a slaveholder. He is the last man to profit 
by this relation. His pride and fierce passions need restraint, 
not perpetual nourishment ; whilst his indisposition to la- 
bor, his desire to live by others' toil, demands the stem 
pressure of necessity to rescue him from dishonorable sloth. 
Under kindlier influences he may take rank among the no- 
blest of his race. 

However, in looking at the South, the first thing which 
strikes my eyes is not the Anglo-Saxon or the Norman, but 
the Slave. I overlook the dwellings of the rich. My 
thoughts go to the comfortless hut of the negro. They go 
to the dark mass at work in the fields. That injured man 
is my brother, and ought not my sympathies to gather 
round him peculiarly 1 Talk not to me of the hospitality, 
comforts, luxuries of the planter's mansion. These are 
all the signs of a mighty wrong. My thoughts turn first 
to the slave. I would not, however, exaggerate his evils. 
He is not the most unhappy man on that soil. True, his 
powers are undeveloped ; but therefore he is incapable of 
the guilt which others incur. He has, as we have seen, a 
generous nature, and his day of improvement, though long 
postponed, is to come. When I see by his side (and is 
the sight very rarel) the self-indulgent man who, from 
mere love of gain and ease, extorts his sweat, I think of 
the fearful words which the Savior has put into the lips of 
the Hebrew patriarch in the unseen world, " Thou in thy 
life time receivedst thy good things, and Lazarus evil 
things ; but now he is comforted and thou art tormented." 
Distinctions founded on wrong endure but for a day. Could 
we now penetrate the future world, what startling revela- 
tions would be made to us ! Before the all-seeing impar- 
tial justice of God, we should see every badge of humilia- 
tion taken off from the fallen, crushed, and enslaved ; and 
where, where would the selfish, unfeeling oppressor ap- 
pear ! 



44 

5. I shall advert but to one more topic suggested by 
Mr. Gurney's book ; I refer to the kind and respectful man- 
ner in which he speaks of many slave-holders. He has no 
.sympathy with those, who set down this class of men in- 
discriminately as the chief of sinners, but speaks with sat- 
isfaction of examples of piety and virtue which he found 
in their number. By some among us this lenity will be 
ascribed to his desire to win for himself golden opinions ; 
but he deserves no such censure. The opinion of slave- 
holders is of no moment to him ; for he has left them for- 
ever, and returns to his own country, where his testimony 
to their worth will find no sympathy, but expose him to 
suspicion, perhaps to reproach. Of the justice of his judg- 
ment I have no doubt. Among slave-holders there may be 
and there are good men. But the inferences from this 
judgment are often false and pernicious. There is a com- 
mon disposition to connect the character of the slave-holder 
and the character of slavery. Many at the North, who by 
intercourse of business or friendship have come to appre- 
ciate the good qualities of individuals at the South, are led 
to the secret if not uttered inference, that a system sus- 
tained by such people can be no monstrous thing. They 
repel indignantly the invectives of the Abolitionists against 
the master, and by a natural process go on to question or 
repel their denunciation of slavery. Here lies the secret 
of much of the want of just feeling in regard to this insti- 
tution. People become reconciled to it in a measure by 
the virtues of its supporters. I will not reply to this error 
by insisting that the virtues, which grow up under slavery, 
bear a small proportion to the vices which it feeds. I take 
a broader ground. I maintain that we can never argue 
safely from the character of a man to the system he up- 
holds. It is a solemn truth, not yet understood as it should 
be, that the worst institutions may be sustained, the worst 
deeds performed, the most merciless cruelties inflicted by 
the conscientious and the good. History teaches no truth 
more awful, and proofs of it crowd on us from the records 
of the earliest and latest times. Thus, the worship of the 
immoral deities of heathenism was sustained by the great 
men of antiquity. The bloodiest and most unrighteous 



45 

wars have been instigated by patriots. For ages the Jews 
were thought to have forfeited the rights of men, as much 
as the African race at the South, and were insulted, spoil- 
ed, and slain, not by mobs, but by sovereigns and pre- 
lates, who really supposed themselves avengers of the cru- 
cified Savior. Trajan and Marcus Aurelius, men of sin- 
gular humanity, doomed Christians to death, surrendering 
their better feelings to what they thought the safety of the 
State. Few names in history are more illustrious than 
Isabella of Castile. She was the model in most respects 
of a noble woman. But Isabella outstripped her age in 
what she thought pious zeal against heretics. Having ta- 
ken lessons in her wars against the Moors, and in the ex- 
termination of the Jews, she entered fully into the spirit 
of the inquisition ; and by her great moral power contribu- 
ted more than any other sovereign to the extension of its 
fearful influence, and thus the horrible tortures and mur- 
ders of that infernal institution, in her ill-fated country, lie 
very much at her door. Of all the causes which have con- 
tributed to the ruin of Spain, the gloomy, unrelenting spirit 
of religious bigotry has wrought most deeply ; so that the 
illustrious Isabella, through her zeal for religion and the 
salvation of her subjects, sowed the seeds of her country's 
ruin. It is remarkable that Spain, in her late struggle for 
freedom, has not produced one great man ; and at this mo- 
ment, the country seems threatened with disorganization ; 
and it is to the almost universal corruption, to the want of 
mutual confidence, to the deep dissimulation and fraud 
which the spirit of the inquisition, the spirit of misguided 
religion, has spread through society, that this degradation 
must chiefly be traced. The wrongs, woes, cruelties in- 
flicted by the religious, the conscientious, are among the 
most important teachings of the past. Nor has this strange 
mixture of good and evil ceased. Crimes, to which time 
and usage have given sanction, are still found in neighbor- 
hood with virtue. Examples, taken from other countries, 
stagger belief, but are true. Thus, in not a few regions, 
the infant is cast out to perish by parents who abound in 
tenderness to their surviving children. Our own enormi- 
ties are to be understood hereafter. Slavery is not then 



4^ 

•absol-ved of guilt by the virtue of its supporters, nor are 
its wrongs on this account a whit less tolerable. The in- 
quisition was not a whit less infernal, because sustained 
by Isabella. Wars are not a whit less murderous, because 
waged for our country's glory ; nor was the slave trade 
less a complication of unutterable cruelties, because our 
fathers brought the African here to make him a Christian. 

The gjeat truth, now insisted on, that evil is evil, no 
matter at whose door it lies, and that men acting from 
conscience and religion may do nefarious deeds, needs to 
be better understood, that we may not shelter ourselves or 
our institutions under the names of the great or the good 
who have passed away. It shows us, that in good com- 
pany we may do the work of fiends. It teaches us, how 
important is the culture of our whole moral and rational 
nature, how dangerous to rest on the old and the estab- 
lished without habitually and honestly seeking the truth. 
With these views, I believe at once that slavery is an atro- 
cious wrong, and yet that among its upholders may be 
■ found good and pious people. I do not look on a slave 
country as one of the provinces of Hell. There, as else- 
where, the human spirit may hold communion with God, 
and it may ascend thence to Heaven Still slavery does 
Dot lay aside its horrible nature because of the character of 
some of its supporters. Persecution is a cruel outrage, no 
matter by whom carried on, and so slavery, no matter by 
whom maintained, works fearful evil to bond and free. It 
breathes a moral taint, contaminates young and old, pros- 
trates the dearest rights, and strengthens the cupidity, 
pride, love of power, and selfish sloth on which it is found- 
ed. I readily gjant, that among slaveholders are to be 
found upright, religious men, and especially pious, gentle, 
disinterested, noble-minded women, who sincerely labor to 
be the guardians and benefactors of the slaves, and under 
whose kind control much comfort may be enjoyed. But we 
must not on this account shut our eyes on the evils of the 
institution or forbear to expose them. On the contrary, 
this is the very reason for lifting up our voices against it ; 
for slavery rests mainly on the virtues of its upholders. — 
Without the saoction of good and gre*t names, it would 



47 

feoon die. Were it left as a monopoly to the selfish, cr^&^ 
?]nprincipled, it could not stand a year. It would becom^ 
in men's view as infamous as the slave-trade, and be ranked 
among felonies. It is a solemn duty to speak plainly o^ 
wrongs, which good men perpetrate. It is very easy to 
cry out against crimes which the laws punish, and which 
popular opinion has branded with infamy. What is espe- 
cially demanded of the Christian is, faithful, honest, gen- 
erous testimony against enormities which are sanctioned 
by numbers, and fashion, and wealth, and especially by- 
great and honored names, and which, thus .sustained, lift 
up their heads to Heaven, and repay rebuke with menace 
and indignation. 

I know that there are those who consider all acknow- 
ledgement of the virtues of slave-holders as treachery to the 
cause of freedom. But truth is truth, and must always be 
spoken and trusted. To be just is a greater work than to 
free slaves or propagate religion, or save souls. I have 
faith in no policy but that of simplicity and godly sincerity. 
The crimes of good men in past times, of which I have 
spoken, have sprung chiefly from the disposition to sacri- 
fice the simple primary obligations of truth, justice and hu- 
manity, to some grand cause, such as religion or country, 
which has dazzled and bewildered their moral sense. To 
free the slave, let us not wrong his master. Let us rather 
find comfort in the thought, that there is no unmixed evil, 
that a spirit of goodness mixes more or less with the worst 
usages, and that even slavery is illumined by the virtues 
of the bond and free. 

I have now finished my remarks on Mr. Gurney's book, 
and in doing so I join with my many readers in thanking 
him for the good news he has reported, and in repeating 
his prayers for the success of Emancipation. I now pro- 
ceed to a different order of considerations of great impor- 
tance, and which ought always to be connected with such 
discussions as have now engaged us. The subject before 
us is not one of mere speculation. It has a practical side. 
There are Duties which belong to iw ^s- Individuals), and 



48 

as Free States, in regard to slavery. To these I now ask 
attention. 

I begin with individuals ; and their duty is, to be faith- 
ful in their testimony against this great evil, to speak their 
minds freely and fully, and thus to contribute what they 
may to the moral power of public opinion. It is not enough 
to think and feel justly. Sentiments not expressed, slum- 
ber and too often die. Utterance in some form or other is 
a principal duty of a social being. The chief good which 
an enlightened virtuous mind can do is to bring itself 
forth. Not a few among us have refrained from this duty, 
have been speechless in regard to slavery, through disap- 
probation of what they have called the violence of the Aboli- 
tionists. They have said, that in this rage of the elements 
it was fit to be still. But the storm is passing away. 
Abolitionists, in obedience to an irresistible law of our na- 
ture, has parted with much of its original vehemence. All 
noble enthusiasm pass through a feverish stage, and grow 
wiser and more serene. Still more, the power of the Anti- 
slavery Association is not a little broken by internal divi- 
sions, and by its increasing reliance on political action. It 
has thrown away its true strength, that is, moral influence, 
in proportion as it has consented to mix in the frays of par- 
ty. Now then, when associations are waning, it is time 
for the individual to be heard, time for a free solemn pro- 
test against wrong. 

It is often said, that all moral efforts to forward the 
abolition of slavery are futile ; that to expect men to sacri- 
fice interest to duty is a proof of insanity ; that, as long as 
slavery is a good pecuniary speculation, the South will 
stand by it to the death ; that whenever slave labor shall 
prove a drug, it will be abandoned, and not before. It is 
vain, we are told, to talk, reason, or remonstrate. On this 
ground some are anxious to bring East India cotton into 
competition with the Southern, that, by driving the latter 
from the market, the excessive stimulus to slave breeding 
and the profits of slave labor may cease. And is this true 1 
Must men be starved into justice and humanity 1 Have 
truth, and religion, and conscience no power 1 One thing 
we know, that the insanity of opposing moral influence to 



49 

deep-'rooted evils, has at least great names on its sids. 
The Christian faith is the highest form of this madness and 
folly, and its history shows that " the foolishness of God is 
stronger than men." What an insult is it on the South 
and on human nature, to believe, that millions of slave- 
holders, of all ages, sexes, and conditions, in an age of free- 
dom, intelligence, and Christian faith, are proof against all 
motives but the very lowest. Even in the most hardened, 
conscience never turns wholly to stone. Humanity never 
dies out among a people. After all, the most prevailing 
voice on earth is that of truth. Could Emancipation be ex^ 
torted only by depreciation of slave labor, it would indeed 
be a good ; but how much happier a relation would the 
master establish with the colored race, if from no force but 
that of principle and kindness he should set them free T 
Undoubtedly at the South, as elsewhere, the majority are 
selfish, mercenary, corrupt ; but it would be easy to find 
there more than "ten righteous," to find a multitude of 
upright, compassionate, devout minds, which, if awakened 
from the long insensibility of habit to the evils of sUverv, 
would soon overpower the influence of the merely selfish 
slave-holder. 

"We are told indeed, by the South, that slavery is no con- 
cern of ours, and consequently that the less we say of it 
the better. What I shall the wrongdoer forbid lookers on 
to speak, because the aflfair is a private one, in which others 
must not interfere ? Whoever injures a man binds all men, 
to remonstrate, especially when the injured is loo weak to 
speak in his own behalf. Let none imagine, that by siez- 
ino- a fellow-creature and setting him apart as a chattle, 
they can sever his ties to God or man. Spiritual connexions 
are not so easily broken. You may carry your victim 
ever so far, you may seclude him on a plantation or in a 
cell. But you cannot transport him beyond the sphere of 
Human brotherhood, or cut him otf from his race. The 
great bond of humanity is the last to be dssolved. Other 
ties, those of family and civil society, are severed by death. 
This, founded as it is on what is immortal in our nature, 
has an everlasting sacredness, and is never broken •, and 
e 



50 

every man has a right and still more is bound to lift up 
hi? voice against its violation. 

There are many whose testimony against slavery is very 
much diluted by the fact of its having been so long sanc- 
tioned, not only by usage, but by law, by public force, by 
the forms of civil authority. They bow before numbers and 
prescription. But in an age of enquiry and innovation, when 
other institutions mast make good their title to continuance, 
it is a suspicious tenderness, which fears to touch a heavy 
yoke, because it has grown by time into the necks of our 
fellow-creatures. Do we not know that unjust monopo- 
lies, cruel prejudices, barbarious punishments, oppressive in- 
stitutions, have been upheld by law for ages 1 Majorities 
are prone to think that they can create right by vote, and 
can legalize gainful crimes by calling the forms of justice 
to their support. But these conspiracies against humanity, 
these insults offered to the majesty and immutableness of 
truth and rectitude, are the last forms of wickedness to be 
spared. Selfish men, by combining into a majority, can- 
not change tyranny into right. The whole earth may cry 
out, that this or that man was made to be owned and used 
as a chattle or a brute, by his brother. But his birthright 
as a man, as a rational creature of God, cleaves to him un- 
touched by the clamor. Crimes, exalted into laws, be- 
come therefore the more odious, just as th^ false gods of 
heathenism, when set up of old on the altar of Jehovah, 
shocked his true worshippers the more, by usurping so con- 
spiciously the honors due to him alone. 

It is important that we should each of us bear our con- 
scientious testimony against slavery, not only to swell that 
tide of pubhc opinion, which is to sweep it away, but that 
we may save ourselves from sinking into silent, unsuspect- 
ed acquiescence in the evil. A constant resistance is need- 
ed to this downward tendency, as is proved by the tone of 
feelmg in the free states. What is more common among 
ourselves, than a courteous, apologetic disapprobation of 
slavery, which differs little from taking its part This is 
one of its worst influences. It taints the whole country. — 
The existence, the perpetual presence of a great, prosper- 
ous, unrestrained system of wrong in a community, is one 



51 

«.f the sorest trials to the moral sense of the people, and 
needs to be earnestly withstood. The idea of justice be- 
comes unconsciously obscured in our minds. Our hearts 
become more or less seared to wrong. The South says, 
that slavery is nothing to us at the North. But through our 
trade we are brought into constant contact with it ; we grow 
familiar with it; still more, vve thrive by it ; and the next 
step is easy, to consent to the sacrifice of human beings, 
by whom we prosper. The dead know not their want of 
life, and so a people, whose moral sentiments are palsied 
by the interweaving of all their interests with a system of 
oppression, become degraded without suspecting it. In 
consequence of this connection with slave countries, the 
idea of human rights, that great idea of our age, and on 
which we profess to build our institutions, is darkened, 
weakened among us, so as to be to many little more than a 
sound. A country of licensed, legalized wrongs, is not the 
atmosphere in which the sentiment of reverence for these 
rights can exist in full power. In such a community, there 
may be a respect for the arbitrary rights, which law creates 
and may destroy, and a respect for historical rights, which rest 
pn usage. But the fundamental rights which inhere in man, 
as man, and which lie at the foundation of a just, equitable^ 
benehcent, noble polity, must be imperfectly comprehended. 
This depression of moral sentiment in a people is an evil, 
the extent of which is not easily apprehended. It affects 
and degrades every relation of life. Men. in whose sight 
human nature is stripped of all its rights and dignity, can- 
not love or honor any who possess it, as they ought. In 
offering these remarks I do not forget what I rejoice to 
know, that there is much moral feeling among us in regard 
to slavery. But still there is a strong tendency to indiffer^ 
ence, and to something worse ; and on this account we owe 
it to our own moral health, and to the moral life of society, 
to express plainly and strongly our moral abhorrence of this 
institution. 

This duty is rendered more urgent by the dejjraving ten- 
dency of our political connections and agitations. It ha^ 
been said much too sweepingly, but with some approxima- 
tion to truth, that in this country we have hosts of politi* 



52 

cians, but no statesmen ; meaning by the latter term, men 
of comprehensive, far-reaching views, who study the per- 
manent good of the community, and hold fast under all 
changes to the great principles on which its salvation rests. 
The generality of our public men are mere politicians, pur- 
blind to the future, fevered by the present, merging patriot- 
ism in party spirit, intent on carrying a vote or election, no 
matter what means they use or what precedents they esta- 
blish, and holding themselves absolved froui a strict morali- 
ty in public affairs. A principal object of political tactics 
is to conciliate and gain over to one or another side the 
most important interests of the country ; and of consequence 
the slave interest is propitiated with no small care. No 
party can afford to lose the South. The master's vote is 
too precious to be hazarded by sympathy with the slaves. — 
Accordingly, parties and office-seekers wash their hands of 
abolitionism, as if it were treason, and without committing 
themselves to slavery, protest their innocence of hostility 
to it. How far they would bow to the slave power, were 
the success of a great election to depend on soothing it, 
cannot be foretold, especially since we have seen the party 
most jealous of popular rights, surrendering to this power 
the right of petition. In this state of things the slavehold- 
ing hiterest has the floor ot Congress very much to itself. 
Now and then a man of moral heroism meets it with erect 
front, and a tone of conscious superiority. But political 
life does not abound in men of heroic mould. Military he- 
roes may be found in swarms. Thousands die fearlessly on 
the field of battle, or the field of " honor." But the moral 
courage, which can stand cold looks, frowns, and contempt, 
asks counsel of higher oracles than people or rulers, and 
cheerfully gives up preferment to a just cause, is rare enough 
to be canonized. In such a country the tendency to cor 
ruption of moral sentiment in regard to slavery, is strong. 
Many are tempted to acquiescence in it ; and of conse- 
quence the good man, the friend of humanity and his coun- 
try, should meet the danger by strong, uncompromising 
reprobation of this great wrong. 

I would close this topic with observing, that there is one 
portion of the community, to which I would especially com- 



52 
tnend the cause of the enslaved, and the dutv of open tes- 
timony against this form of oppression; and that is, our 
women. To them, above all others, slavery should seem 
an intolerable evil, because its chief victims are women. — 
In their own country, and not very far from 'hem, there are 
great multitudes of their sex exposed to dishonor, held as 
property by mrt?i, unprotected by law, driven to the field by 
the overseer, and happy if not consigned to infininely baser 
uses, denied the rights of wife and mother, and liable to be 
stript of husband and child when another's pleasure or inte- 
rest may so determine. Such is the lot of hundreds of 
thousands of their sisters ; and is there nothing here to stir 
up woman's sympathy, nothing for her to remember when 
she approaches God's throne or opens her heart to her fel- 
low creatures 1 Woman should talk of the enslaved to her 
husband, and do what she can to awaken, amongst his ever 
thronging worldly cares, some manly indignation, some in- 
terest in human freedom. She should breathe into her son 
a deep sense of the wrongs which man inflicts on man. and 
send him forth from her arms a friend of the weak and in- 
jured. She should look on her daughter, and shudder at 
the doom of so many daughters on her ovirn shores. When 
she meets with woman, she should talk with her of the ten 
thousand homes which have no defence against licentious- 
ness, against violation of the most sacred domestic ties ; 
and through h:r whole intercourse, the fit season should be 
chosen to g.ve strength to ihat deep moral conviction which 
can alone overcome this tremendous evil. 

I know it will be said, that in thus doing, woman will 
wander beyond her sphere, and forsake her proper work. — 
What ! do I hear such language in a civilized a.ge, and in a 
land of Christianity 1 What, let me ask, is woman's work 1 
It is to be a minister of Christian love. It is to sympathize 
with human misery. It is to breathe sympathy into man's 
heart. It is to keep alive in society some feehng of human 
brotherhood. This is her mission on earth. Woman's 
sphere, I am told, is home. And why is home instituted 1 
Why are domestic relations ordained 1 These relations are 
for a day ; they cease at the grave. And what is their great 
end] To nourish a love which will endure forever, t^o 
awaken universal sympathy. Our ties to our pareats are Jo 



64 ' 

bind us to tKe Universal Parent. Our fraternal bonds to 
help us to see in all men our brethren. Home is to be a 
nursery of Christians ; and what is the end of Christianity 
but to awaken in all souls the principles of universal justice 
and universal charity. At home we are to learn to love our 
neighbor, our enemy, the stranger, the p8or, the oppressed. 
If home do not train us to this, then it is wofully perverted. 
If home counteract and quench the spirit of Christianity, 
then we must remember the Divine Teacher, who com- 
mands us to forsake father and mother, brother and sister, 
wife and child, for His sake, and for the sake of his truth. 
If the walls of home are the bulwarks of a narrow, clan- 
nish love, through which the cry of human miseries and 
wrongs cannot penetrate, then it is mockery to talk of their 
sacredness. Domestic life is at present too much in hostili- 
ty to the spirit of Christ. A family should be a community 
of dear friends, strengthening one another for the service 
of their fellow creatures. Can we give the name of Chris- 
tian to most of our families ■? Can we give it to women 
who have no thoughts or sympathies for multitudes of their 
own sex, distant only two or three days' journey from their 
doors, and exposed to outrages, from which they would 
pray to have their own daughter snatched, though it were 
by death. 

Having spoken of the individual, I proceed to speak of the 
duties of the free States, in their political capacity, in retrard 
to slavery ; and these may be reduced to two heads, both of 
them negative. The first is, to abstain as rigidly from the 
use of political power against slavery in the States where it 
is established, as from exercising it against slavery in 
foreign communities. The second is, to free ourselves 
from all obligation to use the powers of the national or 
state governments in any manner whatever for the support 
of slavery. 

The first duty is clear. In regard to slavery, the south- 
ern States stand on the ground of foreign communities. — 
They are not subject or responsible to us more than these. 
No State sovereignty can intermeddle with the institutions 
of another. We might as legitimately spread our legisla- 
tion over the schools, churches, or persons of the South, as 
over their slaves. And in regard to the General Govern- 



55 

ment, we know that it was not intended to confer any pow- 
€r, direct or indirect, on the free, over the slave States. — ■ 
Any pretension to such power on the part of the North, 
Would have dissolved immediately the convention which 
framed the Constitution. Any act of the free States, when 
assembled in Congre=s, for the abolition of slavery in other 
States, would be a violation of the national compact, and 
would be just cause of complaint. 

On this account I cannot but regret the disposition of a 
part of our abolitionists to organize themselves into a politi- 
-cal party. Were it indeed their simple purpose to free the 
North from all obligation to give support to slavery, I should 
agree with them in their end, though not in their means. — 
By looking, as they do to political organization, as a means 
of putting down the institution in other States, they lay 
themselves open to reproach. I know, indeed, that excel- 
lent men are engaged in this movement, and I acquit thera 
of all disposition to transcend the li.mits of the Federal 
Constitution. But it is to be feared that they may construe 
this instrument too literally ; that, forgetting its spirit, ihey 
may seek to use its powers for purposes very remote from 
its original design. Their failure is almost inevitable. By 
extending their agency beyond its true bounds, they insure 
its defeat in its legitimate sphere. By assuming a political 
■character, they lose the reputation of honest enthusiasts, 
and come to be considered as hypocritical seekers after 
place and power. Should they, in opposition to all proba- 
bility, become a formidable party, they would unite the 
slaveholding States as one man ; and the South, always 
able, when so united; to link with itself a party at the North, 
would rule the country as before. 

No association, like the abolitionists, formed for a par- 
ticular end, can, by becoming a political organization, rise 
to power. If it can contrive to perpetuate itself, it will 
provoke contempt by the disproportion of its means to its 
ends ; but the probability is, that it will be swallowed up 
in the whirlpool of one of the other of the great national 
parties, from whose fury hardly any thing escapes. These 
mighty forces sweep all lesser political organizations be- 
fore them. And these are to be robbed of their pernicious 

L.ofC. 



66* 

power, not by forming a third party, but by the increase of 
intelligence and virtue in the community, and by the silent 
flowing together of reflecting, upright, independent men, 
who will feel themselves bound to throw off the shackles 
of party ; who will refuse afiy longer to neutralise their 
moral itifluence by coalition with the self-seeking, the hol- 
low-hearted, and the double-tongued ; whose bond of union 
will be, the solemn purpose to speak the truth without 
adulteration, to adhere to the right without compromise, to 
support good measures and discountenance bad, come from 
what quarter they may, to be just to all parties, and to 
expose alike the corruptions of all. There are now among 
us good and true men enough to turn the balance on all 
great questions, would they but confide in principle, and 
be loyal to it in word and deed. Under their influence, 
newspapers might be established, in which men and mea- 
sures of all parties would be tried without fear or favor, by 
the moral. Christian law ; and this revolution of the press 
would do more than all things for the political regeneration 
of the country. The people would learn from it, that whilst 
boasting of liberty, they are used as puppets and tools ; that 
popular sovereignty, wiih all its paper bulwarks, is a show 
rather than a substance, as long as party despotism en- 
dures. It is by such a broad, generous improvement of 
society, that our present political organizations are to be 
put down, and not by a third party on a narrow basis, and 
which, instead of embracing all the interests of the coun- 
try, confines itself to a smgle point. 

I cannot but express again regret at the willingness of 
the abolitionists to rely on and pursue political power. — 
Their strength has always lain in the simplicity of their re- 
ligious trust, in their confidence in Christian truth. For- 
merly, the hope sometimes crossed my mind; that, by en- 
larging their views and purifying their spirit, they would 
gradually become a religious community, founded on the 
recognition of God as the common, equal Father of all 
mankind, on the recognition of Jesus Christ as having 
lived and died to unite to himself and to baptize with his 
spirit every human soul, and on the recognition of the bro- 
therhood of all the members of God's human family. — 



57 

There are signs that Christians are tending, however 
slowly, toward a church, in which these great ideas of 
Christianity will be realized ; in which a spiritual reverence 
for God, and for the human soul, will take place of the cus- 
tomary homage paid to outward distinctions ; and in which 
our present narrow sects will be swallowed up. I thought, 
that I saw in the principles with which the abolitionists 
started, a struggling of the human mind toward this Chris- 
tian union. It is truly a disappointment to see so many 
of their number becoming a political party, an association 
almost always corrupting, and most justly suspected on 
account of the sacrifices of truth, and honor, and moral in- 
dependence, which it extorts even from well-disposed men. 
Their proper work is to act oh all parties, to support each 
as far as it shall be true to human rights, to gather labor- 
ers for the good cause from all bodies, civil and religious, 
and to hold forth this cause as a universal interest, and not 
as the property or stepping stone of a narrow association. 
I know that it is said, that nothing but this political ac- 
tion can put down slavery. Then slavery must continue ; 
and if we faithfully do our part as Christians, we are not 
responsible for its continuance. We are not to feel, as if 
we were bound to put it down by any and every means. 
We do not speak as Christians, when we say that slavery 
nuist and shall fall. Who are we to dictate thus to om- 
nipotence 1 It has pleased the mysterious providence of 
God, that terrible evils should be left to overshadow the 
earth for ages. "How long, Lord I" has been the se- 
cret cry extorted from good men by the crimes of the 
world for six thousand years. On the philanthropist of 
this age, the same sad burden is laid, and it cannot be re- 
moved. We must not feel, that were slavery destroyed, 
paradise would be restored. As in our own souls the con- 
quest of one evil passion reveals to us new spiritual foes, 
so in society, one great evil hides in its shadow others per- 
haps as fearful, and its fall only summons us to new etibrts 
for the redemption of the race. We know indeed, that 
good is to triumph over evil in this world ; that " Christ 
must reign, till he shall put all enemies beneath his feet," 
or until his Spirit shall triumph over the spirit, oppres- 
sions, corruptions of the world. Let us then work against 



68 

afi wrong, but with a calm, solemn earnestness, not with 
vehemence and tumult. Let us work with deep reverence 
and filial trust toward God, and not in the proud impetu-- 
osity of our own wills. Happy the day, when such la- 
borers shall be gathered by an inward attraction into one 
.church or brotherhood, whose badge, ere id, spirit, shall be 
Universal Love. This will be the true kingdom of God on 
earth, and its might will infinitely transcend political power. 

For one, I have no desire to force Emancipation on the 
South. Had I political power, I should fear to use it in 
such a cause. A forced Emancipation is, on the whole, 
working well in the West Indies, because the mother 
country watches over and guides it, and pours in abund- 
antly moral and religious influences to calm, and enlighten, 
and soften the minds newly set free. Here no such con- 
trol can be exercised. Freedom at the South, to work 
•well, must be the gift of the masters. Emancipation must 
be their own act and deed. It must spring from good will 
and sense of justice, or at least from a sense of interest, 
and not be extorted by a foreign power ; and with this ori- 
gin, it will be more successful even than the experiment 
in the West Indies. In those islands, especially in Ja- 
maica, the want of cordial co-operation on the part of the 
planters has continually obstructed the beneficial working of 
freedom, and still throws a doubtfulness over its complete 
success. 

I have said, that the free States cannot rightfully use the 
power of their own legislatures or of Congress, to abolish 
slavery in the States where it is established. Their first 
duty is to abstain from such acts. Their next and more 
solemn duty is to abstain from all action for the support of 
slavery. If they are not to subvert, much less are they to 
sustain it. There is some excuse fpr communities, when, 
under a generous impulse, they espouse the cause of the 
oppressed in other states, and by force restore their rights ; 
but they are without excuse in aiding other states in bind- 
ing on men an unrighteous yoke. On this subject, our fa- 
thers, in framing the constitution, swerved from the right.. 
We, their children, at the end of half a century, see the 
p^tb of duty more clearly than they, and must walk in if. 



59 

'to this point the public mind has long been tending, sn^ 
the time has come for looking at it fully, dispassionately, 
and with manly and Christian resolution. This is not a 
question of Abolitionism. It has nothing to do with put- 
ting down slavery. We are simply called as communities, 
to withhold support from it, to stand aloof, to break off ail 
connection with this criminal institution. The free States 
ought to say to the South, " Slavery is yours not ours, and 
on you the whole responsibility of it must fall. We wash 
our hands of it wholly. We shall exert no power against 
it ; but do not call on us to put forth the least power in its 
behalf. We cannot, directly or indirectly, become acces- 
sories to this wrong. We cannot become jailers, or a pa- 
trol, or a watch, to keep your slaves under the yoke. You 
must guard them yourselves. If they escape, we cannot 
send them back. Our soil makes whoever touches it, free. 
On this point you must manage your own concerns. In 
case of insurrection we cannot come to you, save as friends 
alike of bond and free. Neither in our separate legisla- 
tures, nor in the national legislature, can we touch slaverv, 
to sustain it. On this point you are foreign communities. 
You have often said, that you need not our protection ;■ 
and we must take you at your word. In so doing we have 
no thought erf acting on your fears. We think only of our 
duty, and this, in ail circumstances, and at all hazards, must 
be done." 

The people of the North think but little of the extent of 
the support given to slavery by the Federal Government ; 
(hough, when it is considered that " the slave-holding in- 
terest has a representation in Congress of twenty-Jive mem- 
bers in addition to the fair and equal representation of the 
free inhabitants," it is very natural to expect the exercise 
of the powers of Congress in behalf of this institution.-— 
The Federal Government has been and is the friend of the 
slave-holder, and the enemy of the slave. It authorizes the 
former to seize, in a free state, a colored man, on the ground 
of being a fugitive, and to bring him before a justice of 
peace of his own selection ; and this magistrate, without a 
jury, or without obligation to receive any testimony but 
what the professed master offers, can deliver up the accu- 



60 

sed, lo be held as property for life. The Federal Govern- 
ment authorizes not only the apprehension and imprison^ 
ment, in the District of Columbia, of a negro suspected o{ 
being a runaway, but the sale of him as a slave, if within a 
certain time he cannot prove his freedom. It sustains sla* 
very within the District of Columbia, though " under its 
exclusive jurisdiction," and allows this district to be one of 
the chief siave-marts of the country. Not a slave auction 
is held there, but by the authority of Congress. The Fed" ■ 
eral Government has endeavored to obtain, by negociation, 
the restoration of fugitive slaves who have sought and found 
freedom in Canada, and has offered in return to restore fu- 
gitives from the "West Indies. It has disgraced itself in 
the sight of all Europe, by claiming as property slaves, who 
have been shipwrecked on the British islands, and who by 
touching British soil had become free. It has instructed its 
representative at Madrid, to announce to the Spanish courly 
" that the Emancipation of the slave populatian of Cuba 
would be very severely felt in the adjacent shores of the 
United States." It has purchased a vast unsettled territo- 
ry, which it has given up to be overrun with slavery. To 
crown all, it has, in violation of the constitution, and of the 
riwht granted even by despotism to its subjects, refused to 
listen to petitions against these abuses of power. After 
all this humbling experience, is it not time for the free 
States to pause, to reflect, to weigh well what they are do- 
ing through the national government, and to resolve that 
they will free themselves from every obligation to uphold 
an institution wtiich they know to be unjust.* 

The object now proposed, is to be effected by amend- 
ments to the constitution, and these should be sought in 
good faith ; that is, not as the means of abolishing slavery, 
but as a means of removing us from a participation of its 
guilt. The free states should take the high ground of du- 
ty ; and to raise them to this height, the press, the pulpit, 

* On the subject of this paragraph, the reader will do well to con- 
sult "A View of the Action of the Federal Government in behalf of 
Slavery, by Wm. Jay." The author is a son of Chief Justice Jay^ 
and a worthy repr'eseatative of the spirit and principles of his illus- 
trious father. 



61 

and all religious and upright men should join their powefS/ 
A people under so pure an impulse, cannot fail. Such ar- 
rangements should be made, that the word slavery need 
not be again heard in Congress or in the local legislatures. 
On the principle now laid down, the question of abolition 
in the District of Columbia should be settled. Emancipa- 
tion at the seat of Government ought to be insisted on^ 
not for the purpose of influencing slavery elsewhere, but 
because what is done there is done by the whole people, be- 
cause slavery sustained there is sustained by the free 
States. It is said, that the will of the citizens of the DistricS 
is to be consulted. Were this true, which cannot be grant- 
ed, the difficulty may easily be surmounted. Let Congress 
resolve to establish itself where it will have no slavery tO' 
control or uphold, and the people of the District of Co- 
lumbia will remove the obstacle to its continuance where 
it isf as fast as can be desired. 

The great difficulty in the way of the arrangement now 
proposed, is the article of the constitution requiring the 
surrender and return of fugitive slaves. A State, obey- 
ing this, seems to me to contract as great guilt as if it were 
to bring slaves from Africa No man, who regards slavery 
as among the greatest wrongs, can in any way reduce his- 
fellow creatures to it. The flying slave asserts the first 
rights of a man, and should meet aid rather than obstruc- 
tion. Who that has the heart of a freeman, or breathes 
the love of a Christian, can send him back to his chain 1 — - 
On this point, however, the difficulty of an arrangement is 
every day growing less. This provision of the constitution 
is undergoing a silent repeal, and no human power can sus- 
tain it. Just in proportion as slavery becomes the object 
of conscientious reprobation in the free States, just so fast 
the difficulty of sending, back the fugitive increases. In 
the part of the country where I reside, it is next to impos- 
sible that the slave, who has reached us, should be restored 
to bondage. Not that our courts of law are obstructed ; 
not that mobs would rescue the fugitive from the magis- 
trate. We respect the public authorities. Not an arm 
would be raised against the officers of justice. But what 
are laws against the moral sense of a community 1 No 
f 



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Pi 011 899 008 0'^^ ^^^ character, would aid th'^ 
^ ..-.Iter here would be looked on 

wjth as little favor as the felonious slave trader. Thosf 
among us, who dread to touch slavery in its own region, 
lest insurrection and tumults should follow change, still 
feel, that the fugitive who has sought shelter so far, can 
breed no tumult in the land which he has left, and that, o1 
tonsequence, no motive but the unhallowed love of gain ca' 
prompt to his pursuit ; and when they think of slavery ■ 
perpetuated, not for public order, bat for gain, th'ey ablf, 
it, and would not lift a finger to replace the flying bond 
man beneath the yoke. Thus this provision of the ccj 
stitution is virtually fading away ; and, cs I have said, jj 
human power can restore it. The moral sentiment y^ ^ 
community is not to be withstood. Make as many C5 ' ^''^ 
tutions as you will ; fence round your laws witi -i^^ 
penalties you will, the universal conscience makes th V.^t" 
weak as the threats of childhood. There is a spirit '■^'^' 
ing through the country in regard to slavery, whic.- ^1^ 
mands changes of the constitution, and which will ^i^u^' 
if it cannot change it. No concerted opposition tci! /" 
strument is thought of or is needed. No secrf V ^'st 
standing among our citizens is to be feared at th* "^ ^^' 
The simple presence to their minds of the gre'''i''^"f'^ 
that man cannot rightfully be the property of man,'i'^syestic 
to shelter the slave. With this conviction we L'^*^"^^^ 
stricken, when called upon to restore him to bondage. •, "^ 
sinews are relaxed ; our hands hang down ; our limbs k- 
not carry us a step. Now this conviction is spreading, ^J 
will become the established principle of the free State».; 
Politicians, indeed, to answer a party end, may talk i 
property in man, as something established or not to be que. 
tioned ; but the people at large tro not follow them. 1' 
people go with the civilized and Christian world. The South 
should understand this, should look the difficulty ih the face ; 
and they will see that, front- the nature of the case, resist- 
ance is idle, that neither policy nor violence can avail.— »• 
And what is more, they have no right to reproach us with 
letting this provision of the constitution die among us. — 
Tkey have done worse. We are passive. They have ac- 



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011 899 008 



